PRACTICAL HANDBOOK 

OF 

MODERN LIBRARY 
CATALOGING 



WILLIAM WARNER BISHOP, A.M. 

i > 

Superintendent of the Reading Room 
lAhrary of Congress 



BALTIMORE 

WILLIAMS & WILKINS CO. 

1914 






Copyright, 1914 

BY 

Wm. Warner Bishop 



Mil im 



©CI,A374385 



DEDICATED 

TO 
MY MOTHER 



PREFACE 

In setting examinations in library science, in- 
cluding cataloging, for the United States Civil Serv- 
ice Commission for several years, I was constantly 
struck by the absence in our professional literature 
of any manual of the actual practice of cataloging. 
There are numerous codes of rules and articles on 
the theory of cataloging. But something which 
should tell a student of library administration just 
what has to be done under modern conditions and 
why it should be done seemed lacking. I have 
accordingly written this brief handbook in an 
endeavor to supply this need. 

To librarians and catalogers trained in their 
work by long years of service much of what is here 
set forth will doubtless seem very obvious and 
commonplace. I have had constantly in mind two 
sorts of persons by whom librarians have been 
much besought for years past for information as 
to "how to do it." One group — and by far the 
larger — is composed of young people entering on 
the professional study of library processes either 
in library schools or without formal instruction. 
The other is the comparatively small, but actually 
large, number of persons who for one reason or 
another find themselves charged with the responsi- 
bility for the work of a library without having 

5 



6 PREFACE 

themselves served an apprenticeship in all its 
branches. The point of view in this little book is 
throughout that of the administration of the library 
as a whole, rather than that of the conduct of cata- 
loging work alone. 

Modern American cataloging practice is based on 
the printed card supplied from a central bureau — 
at present the Card Section of the Library of Con- 
gress. Over six hundred thousand titles are now 
available, and the number grows by over fifty 
thousand a year. Naturally this fundamental 
principle of modern cataloging is absent from both 
the older works on cataloging and library economy, 
and the British and foreign treatises on those sub- 
jects. But even the present large supply is not 
yet equal to the demand — so diverse are the con- 
tents of our libraries. Hence the process of making 
cards in each library for all books added — formerly 
universal — still requires description and study. 

The final chapter on Subject Headings is the 
only venture in the book into the realm of cata- 
loging theory, justifiable, it was thought, because 
of the dearth of books on this most important 
branch of cataloging. 

I have been greatly aided by the criticisms of 
Miss Agnes Van Valkenburgh, instructor in cata- 
loging in the Library School of the New York 
Pubhc Library, and of Dr. G. E. Wire, Deputy 
Librarian of the Worcester County Law Library, 



PREFACE 7 

Worcester, Mass., who have kindly read the manu- 
script. Of course they are in no way chargeable for 
the opinions set forth. I desire to express to them 
my hearty thanks for their courtesy in thus aiding 
me. 

William Warner Bishop. 
Washington, B.C. 
April 15, 1914. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Chapter I. Brief Sketch of the History of Li- 
brary Cataloging 11 

Ancient and mediaeval libraries — Catalogs in 
book form — Ledger catalogs — Catalogs of great 
libraries — American library catalogs — Card form 
— Earlier type — Printed catalog cards — Library 
of Congress printed cards. 

Chapter II. Rooms and Equipment 19 

Rooms — Location, floor plan — Furniture, ma- 
chinery, etc. — Card cases and shelves — Reference 
books — Cards — Size — ^Weight and quality — Ruling 
— Guide cards. 

Chapter III. Planning the Catalog 33 

Nimiber and kinds of catalogs. "Unit" card — 
Ofl&cial catalog — Full or short catalogs — Forms of 
catalogs — Dictionary, classed, alphabetic-classed. 
Decision. 

Chapter IV. Organization of the Cataloging 

Force 50 

Head cataloger — Revision — Assignment and 
specializing — Statistics — Budget — Qualifications 
of catalog3rs — Salaries — Hours. 

Chapter V. Use of Printed Catalog Cards 63 

Two kinds of modern practice — Catalog rules — 
Cards — Printed cards from the Library of Congress. 
Number needed — Ordering — Accounting — Order- 
ing when book is ordered — "Traveling Catalogs" — 
Scope of Library of Congress stock — Printed cards 
from other libraries — Use in the library. 

9 



10 CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Chapter VI. Cataloging Method 78 

Rules and decisions — Codes — Guides — Decisions 
— Old entries and new rules — Decisions on subject 
headings — Unit card — Routine — Assignment — 
Main entry — Title — Edition — Imprint — Collation 
— Notes — Contents — Evaluation — Series cards — 
Analyticals — Added entries — Copying — Hecto- 
graph, Flexotype, Typewriter, Hand copying — Fil- 
ing — ^Arrangement — Guide cards. 

Chapter VII. Subject Headings Ill 

Introduction — Uniformity in rules — Simplicity — 
Uniformity in treatment — Practice — Changes in 
nomenclature — Definition — Encyclopaedias as 
models — Specific headings — Class headings — Re- 
gion or subject — Ethnic adjective — Inversion — 
Geographical headings — Ancient and modern re- 
gional names — Period divisions under country — 
Misnomers — Subjects having an old and a modern 
literature — Arrangement by period — Number of 
cards to a book — Revision — Official list. 



Chapter I 

BRIEF SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF LIBRARY 
CATALOGING 

We have practically no knowledge of the details 
of administration of the libraries of the ancients. 
That they had catalogs is inherent in the nature of 
things. There are a few references to lists, such 
as the irlvaKes of the celebrated Alexandrian library, 
but no description on which we may base any 
statement of method in either Greek or Roman 
libraries.^ The catalogs that remain to us of 
mediaeval libraries were printed by Becker at Bonn 
in 1885. Those prior to the thirteenth century 
Becker gave in full; later catalogs he merely listed 
by title with indications of the places where they 
were printed. ^ 

With the invention of printing and the consequent 
rapid growth of libraries both in number and size, 
catalogs of libraries in book form began to appear 

^ The well known passage in Quintilian, Instit. Orat. x, 
1, 67, is frequently cited as proving the use of catalogs in 
Roman libraries. 

2 Becker, Gustav. Catalogi bibliothecarum antiqui. I. 
Catalogi saeculo xiii vetustiores. II. Catalogus catalog- 
orum posterioris aetatis. Bonnae, apud Max Cohen et 
Filium (Fr. Cohen). A. mdccclxxxv. p. iv, 229. 

11 



12 MODEKN LIBEARY CATALOGING 

and have continued to the present day. Despite 
their number — which is legion — few, if any, of the 
earlier printed library catalogs have much signifi- 
cance as models at the present day. In general it 
may be said that (with a few notable exceptions) 
the great libraries were unable to publish catalogs 
revealing their contents in full. Manuscript entries 
in various styles of ledgers were commonly resorted 
to as a means of providing an index to the collec- 
tions. Catalogs of special collections, as those of 
mediaeval manuscripts, were more frequently 
entrusted to print. This is the plan still prevailing 
in many libraries of distinction on the continent of 
Europe — a book (or ledger) catalog with entries in 
writing for the general collection, and printed cata- 
logs of those portions which because of their value 
or their form demand special treatment. 

In England and later in America it became the 
fashion for public and subscription libraries to 
print brief catalogs of their books. Of course such 
catalogs required supplements at frequent intervals. 
The book catalog — frequently exhibiting the brief- 
est form of entry — was the typical library publi- 
cation up to the third quarter of the nineteenth 
century. Our older libraries possess scores of 
them — useful as finding-lists at the time issued — 
but too often curiosities with but slight historical 
value a couple of decades later. 

The convenience of the catalog in book form has 



HISTORY OF LIBRARY CATALOGING 13 

been, and always will be, its chief merit. Certain 
very notable achievements marked this fashion of 
recording a library's contents. Chief of these is 
the great Catalogue of Printed Books of the British 
Museum.^ 

The high authority of this catalog, based on 
Panizzi's ''Rules,'' and the wealth of the library 
revealed by its pages have made it the one great 
and indispensable cataloging tool for librarians and 
literary students the world over. But — very sig- 
nificantly — it stops with the year 1899. The 
annual accessions catalog goes on, as do the numer- 
ous special catalogs. 

The Bibliotheque Nationale of France has at- 
tempted the publication of a catalog of authors on 
a similar scale. But though begun in 1897, the 
Catalogue general des livres imprimes has reached 
but the end of the letter E in fifty large volumes. 
The cost in time and money of such an enterprise 
is too vast for any but a national treasury. 

In this country the most notable printed catalogs 
in book form have been those of the Boston Athe- 
naeum,^ the Astor Library, the Peabody Institute of 

3 Catalogue of Printed Books in the Library of the British 
Museum. London, W. Clowes and Sons, Ltd., 1881-1900; 
Supplement, 1900-1906. 

* Boston Athenaeum. Catalogue of the Library, 1807- 
1871. 5 vols., by Charles A. Cutter. 

Peabody Institute, Baltimore. Catalogue of the Library 



14 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

Baltimore, the Surgeon General's Library, and the 
Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh. 

To these should perhaps be added the excellent 
catalogs of the Brooklyn Library and of the Detroit 
Public Library. The latter affords an admirable 
example of the difficulties under which this form of 
catalog labors. Published originally in 1889 with 
some 1100 pages (exclusive of fiction and French 
and German books), it sufficed (with annual lists 
of additions) until 1894, when a supplement of 
almost 900 pages was required. In 1899 appeared 
a second supplement of 860 pages bringing the list 
down to 1898. Already there were three places 
in which to look for books by a given author or on 
a given topic. The expense of editing and printing 
such a series becomes prohibitive exactly as its 
usefulness as a timely working tool diminishes. 

The Card Catalog is a development of the nine- 
teenth century, although it was known in France 

of the Peabody Institute. 5 vols. Baltimore, 1883-92. 
Second Catalogue, 8 vols. 1896-1905. 

Astor Library, New York. Catalogue. 5 vols. New 
York, 1857-1866. Continuation, 4 vols. Cambridge, 1886- 
1888. 

U. S. Surgeon-General's Office. Library. Index-Cata- 
logue of the Library. 16 vols. Washington, 1880-1895. 
Second series, 18 vols. [A-Tz] 1896-1913. 

Pittsburgh, Carnegie Library. Classified catalogue, 
1895-1902. 3 vols. Pittsburgh, 1907. 1902-1906, 5 vols. 
Pittsburgh, 1907-1908. 1907-1911, 6 vols., 1912-1913. 



HISTORY OF LIBRARY CATALOGING 15 

in the eighteenth. Its rapid spread and adoption 
in libraries and commercial institutions (to an even 
greater extent than in libraries) is one of the most 
significant features of modern library history. 
Practically all American libraries of importance 
use the card form of catalog, even when they also 
publish extensive book catalogs. 

The earlier manuals and rules of cataloging were 
all based on the assumption that the cataloger who 
made the first entry for a book would also make all 
the additional entries, i.e., subject cards, reference 
cards, title cards, etc. Consequently in order to 
save the time of the cataloger, (perhaps also with a 
view to saving manual labor and time of subordi- 
nate helpers in the library, and even the reader's 
time and strength), the various cards for different 
purposes varied in fullness, the main entry card 
being generally the fullest. The other cards were 
shortened by the omission of certain details. Thus 
one card only would bear all the information nec- 
essary to the complete identification of a book, 
while the other (shorter) cards would, it was 
thought, serve most practical purposes. 

The chief defects of this method lay in the time 
consumed in manufacturing cards (even with these 
devices for shortening the processes and the drudg- 
ery) on the part of a trained specialist in cataloging, 
the time expended in the necessary revision of the 
manual work of reproduction (whether done by 



16 MODEKN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

pen or typewriter), and finally the time necessarily 
lost by readers in consulting the catalog even when 
the plainest 'library hand" or the best typewriters 
were employed. Libraries, though progressive 
enough to use the card catalog, had not emerged 
into the era of printing for this record of their 
contents. The issue had ordinarily been a clear 
one. Either a printed catalog in book form which 
was generally out of date before publication, and 
whose cost was prohibitive for institutions hard 
pressed for funds by development in directions 
other than cataloging — or else a card catalog, easily 
kept up to date and manufactured at practically 
the cost of preparing copy for the printer, but some- 
what clumsy of operation and necessarily less 
quickly scanned than the printed page.^ 

Everything pointed to substituting printed card 
catalogs for printed book catalogs, particularly in 
libraries which needed to use many entries for each 
book, not alone in their public card catalogs, but 
in "official" catalogs, shelf -lists, accession records, 
binding lists, serial records, and the like. Theorists 
had pointed out as early as 1851,^ that a printed 

^ An additional drawback to the card catalog, long felt 
in scholarly libraries, was the fact that on the standard 
size card adopted soon after the organization of the Amer- 
ican Library Association in 1876 there was frequently not 
space for the detailed written description of a book. 

^ Jewett, Charles CoflSn. A plan for stereotyping cata- 



HISTORY OF LIBRARY CATALOGING 17 

card was the logical accompaniment of the printed 
book. Efforts were made by the Library Bureau 
in the early nineties to make the supplying of 
printed catalog cards a commercial possibility, but 
with only indifferent success. Various American 
libraries began printing cards for their own use 
between 1890 and 1900. The American Library 
Association undertook through its Publishing 
Board to supply printed cards for certain sets and 
serials. Finally the Library of Congress, which 
had begun in 1899 to print cards for copyrighted 
books, undertook in 1901 to apply this method not 
alone to copyright entries but to all its books, and 
to sell its cards to other libraries. Thus the Li- 
brary of Congress became in effect a central cata- 
loging bureau for the United States — and for other 

logues by separate titles, and for forming a general stereo- 
typed catalogue of public libraries of the United States. 
Washington, 1851. {Proceedings of the American Associa- 
tion for the Advancement of Science, August, 1850.) 

Jewett, Charles Coffin. On the construction of cata- 
logues of libraries, and of a general catalogue: and their 
publication by means of separate, stereotyped titles. With 
rules and examples. Washington, Smithsonian Institution, 
1852. 

Cf. also Jahr, Torstein, and Strohm, Adam Julius. 
Bibliography of cooperative cataloguing and the printing 
of catalogue cards, with incidental references to interna- 
tional bibliography and the Universal catalogue, (1850- 
1902) . In Report of the Librarian of Congress, 1902. App. 
vi, p. 109-224. 



18 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

countries — so far as its cards met the needs of other 
libraries. 

The initial stages were not wholly easy, and were 
marked by delays and difficulties incident both to 
the establishment of a new enterprise, the agree- 
ment on a new code of rules, and the prosecution 
of a cataloging and classifying task of unparalleled 
magnitude. For the Library of Congress had 
undertaken the systematic treatment of its entire 
collections, numbering some 800,000 volumes in 
1899, and its annual accessions, which were about 
30,000 volumes at that date, but soon sprang to 
over 100,000 a year. But the work, once thor- 
oughly established and a routine elaborated, has 
developed to a point where the purchase and use 
of printed catalog cards from the Card Section of 
the Library of Congress is the order of the day in 
practically all libraries of any size in the country, 
as well as in many in Canada. Probably in the 
near future further developments in the direction 
of cooperative cataloging may be expected. It is 
entirely possible that mthin a couple of decades one 
may buy standard size printed cards for any modern 
book at the time the book is bought. 



Chapter II 

ROOMS AND EQUIPMENT 

THE CATALOGING ROOMS 

In an old building adapted for library use the 
rooms devoted to cataloging must frequently be 
inconvenient in shape and badly placed with refer- 
ence to the other activities of the library. But 
even in such uncomfortable cases a proper planning 
of the available space with regard to light, location 
of desks and apparatus, book shelves, and the like 
may aid in making the most of circumstances. 
Such provisions for the comfort of the staff and the 
speed of the work as are possible in a new structure 
may be at least approximated by careful and in- 
genious supervision. Attention to the details dis- 
cussed in this chapter may, then, result in a decided 
improvement of arrangements in old and not wholly 
comfortable quarters. 

In new buildings various elements enter into the 
location of the catalog rooms and the shape and 
size to be given them. The tendency to curtail 
working space has proven unfortunate again and 
again. While it is impossible to forecast with 
accuracy the future of cataloging in any given 
library, it seems highly improbable that the relative 
number of catalogers in proportion to the whole 

19 



20 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

force is likely to be greatly diminished with the 
progress of cooperative cataloging. It would be 
safer to err on the side of generosity in the space 
accorded to the cataloging force. If a library now 
has ten or a dozen persons employed in cataloging 
work, it will be well to plan for at least fifteen per- 
sons in providing space in a new building. This 
is a conservative estimate. Many libraries have 
found themselves hampered by cramped and crowded 
cataloging rooms within a year or two of entering 
on the use of new buildings supposedly adequate 
for decades to come. A new building usually 
means increased use, enlargement of resources, 
and hence a larger staff. 

Location of Room. The catalog room should of 
course be near the other rooms assigned to the work- 
ing force which prepares books for the shelves. It 
should, if possible, be part of a series of rooms de- 
voted to this purpose and on the same floor with 
the order clerks, classifiers, and shelf -listers, etc. 
At the same time it is advisable to have the catalog 
room not far removed from the public catalog. It 
is inevitable that there shall be much going to and 
fro between the two, and the shorter the distance 
the less the time lost. The catalog room should 
also be convenient to the book stacks and it is very 
desirable that entrance from it to the stacks be had 
without passing through reading rooms or public 
corridors. Moreover as much natural light as 



ROOMS AND EQUIPMENT 21 

possible should be furnished the catalogers since 
their work calls for continuous use of the eyes for 
practically the whole of their working day. En- 
trance to the cataloging room should be from cor- 
ridors or halls, rather than through other rooms. 

In small library buildings there is not so much 
need to insist on all these requirements. But even 
in small buildings the factors of comparative quiet, 
short distances, convenient access to stacks and 
public catalog can not well be ignored. In large 
buildings care in planning these matters will save 
countless steps, constant loss of energy, and unnec- 
essary interruptions. 

Floor plan of catalog room. A cataloging room 
(or rooms) must have (1) desks and chairs for 
catalogers and copyists, (2) ample aisle space for 
book trucks and for the movement of persons, (3) 
floor space for revolving book cases at catalogers' 
desks, (4) shelves for reference books, (5) card 
catalog cases for both official catalogs and card 
bibliographies, (6) space for certain minor mechan- 
ical apparatus and for washstand, etc., (7) locker 
and cabinet space for supplies. These various 
items are dwelt upon in detail in the following 
pages. A cataloger's desk (5 by 2 J feet), chair, 
book-case, and a truck of books with floor and aisle 
space for free movement will require a space at 
least 10 feet by 6, or 60 square feet of floor. This 
does not allow for catalog cases, book-shelves, etc.. 



22 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

etc., which must be figured separately. A mini- 
mum of 100 square feet to a person is usually 
allowed in planning offices of this sort. 

The desks should be placed with reference to the 
light from the windows, so that the light comes 
naturally on the left of the catalogers when seated 
at the desks. The other arrangements of the room 
should in most cases be subordinated to this of the 
relations between windows and desks. ^ 

The ventilation must conform, of course, to the 
general ventilating and heating system of the build- 
ing. If, however, the location of the catalogers' 
desks is planned in advance with reference to the 
windows it will be possible to avoid direct currents 
of either hot or cold air on persons seated at these 
desks. 

Furniture. A generous material equipment will 
aid greatly in maintaining a high standard of work. 
If the air is bad and the equipment inadequate, an 
even and high-class output is difficult to maintain. 
The catalogers' desks should be flat and reasonably 
large. There is a decided gain in efficiency if the 
chairs are carefully fitted to the individual workers, 

^ The artificial light for the desks is best supplied in the 
form of individual desk lamps, not neglecting, however, 
some provision for general illumination of the room. 
Whenever there is need for night work the desk lights alone 
are insufficient. Switches should always be near the en- 
trance to the room. 



ROOMS AND EQUIPMENT 23 

if proper footrests are provided, and if book trucks 
and trays are furnished in sufficient quantity to do 
away with strain in handling steadily large numbers 
of heavy books. Care in these matters will surely 
pay in results. Eye-strain resulting from facing 
windows or similar faults of position should be 
carefully avoided. When one remembers the ex- 
treme demands which ordinary cataloging (not to 
mention revision of copying or proof), makes on the 
eyes, and the further fact that cataloging calls for 
continual attention week in and week out to minute 
details of books and cards, precautions to avoid 
eye-strain become plain business sense. Even in 
small libraries such precautions can not be neglected 
with impunity. 

Small revolving bookcases at each desk are almost 
a necessary part of the cataloging equipment. So 
also are trays for catalog cards, and desk drawers 
fitted with compartments of standard card size. 

Machinery. In addition to other furniture, 
there is usually needed a certain amount of machin- 
ery in a catalog room. Typewriters are provided 
in many libraries for the writing of all cards. There 
is considerable question as to the wisdom of this 
practice when there are several employees of vari- 
ous grades engaged in cataloging work. In such 
cases the wiser plan seems to be to confine the com- 
pulsory use of the machine to copyists or subordi- 
nate workers, and to continue the ancient practice 



24 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

of writing the original card by hand with the pen. 
When the cataloging is very simple, and can be 
done rapidly, perhaps there is gain in the use of the 
typewriter. When, however, judgment, accuracy, 
and selection are the important factors, as in most 
research libraries, and in all large institutions hav- 
ing many recondite books, the item of speed in 
writing is of secondary importance, and the ad- 
vantage of the typewriter for the initial card 
disappears. 

In addition to typewriters, other forms of dupli- 
cating machinery, hectograph, multigraph, flexo- 
type, and the like, seem likely to become a necessary 
part of the cataloging room's equipment. Perhaps 
a small printing-press, such as that used in some 
libraries for printing subject headings on purchased 
cards, is also to be a future requisite. Floor space 
and light for the accommodation in proper form of 
these mechanical aids should be provided, even if 
at present they are not installed. 

Miscellaneous equipment. It should almost go 
without saying that there should be telephone 
connection (both internal and external) in the cat- 
aloging room. A properly screened stationary 
washstand with hot and cold water should also be 
provided. Books are invariably dusty, and in cat- 
aloging work it is necessary to cleanse the hands 
frequently. A supply of individual towels should 
of course be a part of the equipment, as is required 



ROOMS AND EQUIPMENT 25 

by law in some states. If the library is small, the 
storing of the cataloging supplies — cards, ink, 
pencils, pens, labels, blank forms, etc. — can well 
be cared for in a small cupboard or in the desks. 
But if it is large, special lockers or closets for this 
purpose should not be neglected, even when there 
is a general storeroom. 

Card cases and shelves. In deciding on the 
location of shelves and card catalog cases in the 
cataloging room of a new building it will be well 
to remember that it is more economical of space, 
and usually more convenient as well, to group 
either shelves or cases in one part of the room 
rather than to arrange them around the walls. 
In any case, the relations of bookshelves, card 
cases, and catalogers' desks to the natural and 
artificial light provided should not be neglected. 
Particular care should always be given to furnish- 
ing as nearly as possible overhead lighting for 
catalog cases. The difficulty in reading the lower 
lines of a card which is in partial shadow and like- 
wise tilted at an unfavorable angle should be elimi- 
nated. The factor of time spent in going from 
desks to shelves and card cases should receive 
careful attention. Much unnecessary motion in 
daily routine can be done away by preliminary 
planning of a room or series of rooms. 

A generous and carefully planned equipment on 
the physical side promotes convenience, makes for 



26 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

a high class output, and for loyal, efficient service. 
Careful planning to avoid interference and unnec- 
essary physical effort, to furnish good light, venti- 
lation, and effective tools should result in a satisfied, 
hard-working, and efficient force, be it large or 
small. 

Reference books. It is poor economy to skimp 
on the catalogers' reference books. Even though 
the necessity for the practice of cataloging in the 
individual library is on the wane as the result of 
cooperative effort, the money spent on a catalogers' 
reference collection, and even on a good deal of 
duplication in it, is well invested. The amount of 
time which is often wasted for want of the primary 
reference books in the catalog room is of itself 
sufficient reason for devoting funds to their pur- 
chase. If the reference collection is a strong one, 
not only will it become at once a decided help in 
the way of saving time, strength and energy, but 
the cataloger thoroughly familiar with it is thereby 
a factor of value in all reference work. Particularly 
is this true of the smaller libraries in which the 
familiarity with rather recondite works on the part 
of the catalogers frequently renders them of great 
aid to readers. 2 

2 For lists of reference books for cataloging, cf. New 
York State Library. Cataloguer's reference books. Bul- 
letin No. 84, Bibliography No. 36, 1904. 

Also ibid., Selection of reference books for the use of 



ROOMS AND EQUIPMENT 27 

A library devoted to a special subject or interest 
will of course gather for its catalogers all the avail- 
able bibliographic material on its specialty. 

In planning for the cataloging reference collection 
and its housing it is well to allow ample room for 
growth. If there is anything which the last twenty 
years have made plain, it is that the growth of 
libraries has far outstripped even generous provision 
for their equipment. In fact all plans for catalog- 
ing work — as indeed for all library work — must 
have the possibility of extension in view. Even if 
the relative number of cards made in a particular 
library is to diminish, the actual number prepared 
is likely to grow greater. 

Bibliographies of the future are likely to take 
card as well as book form. In preparing a catalog 
room, therefore, ample provision should be made 
for a large number of card catalog cases for refer- 
ence use in addition to those which must of necessity 
be placed in the room for the library's own product. 
At present the cost of the proof sheets of the Library 
of Congress cards is so low that every library of 

cataloguers in finding full names. Bulletin Bibliography 
No. 5, January 1898. 

Austin, W. H. Report on aids and guides — a summary 
of bibliographical aids to cataloguers, Library Journal, v. 
19, Conf. number, p. 77-80. 

Vienna. Universitat. Katalog der Handbiblioteken 
des Katalogzimmers und des Lesesales. Wien, Ceroid & 
Cie, 1908. 



28 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

any size can afford to purchase, cut, and &\e either 
a complete set of these, — or of the printed cards 
themselves — or else a partial set, to suit its own 
needs. These will form the best available bibliog- 
raphy for the use not only of the catalogers, but of 
the library's clientele. There are numerous card 
bibliographies which can be of the greatest benefit 
to specialized libraries, and their number is steadily 
growing.^ 

Ample provision for a greatly increased number 
of cards as well as of books is therefore a necessity 
of a modern cataloging room. A great deal of 
otherwise unused wall and floor space can be put 
into cheaply finished but well-made metal or 
wooden card cases. These should be numerous 
enough to hold several million cards in the larger 
libraries, and at least a million in smaller ones. 

CARDS 

Size. The '' standard size" card, 7.5 by 12.5 
cm., roughly 3 by 5 inches, has come into such uni- 
versal use in American libraries that practically no 
provision is any longer made for any other size 
of card. The smaller card, ^' index" size, had a 

3 Examples of such card bibliographies are the various 
card indexes published by the Concilium Bibliographicum 
of Zurich in certain fields of natural science, and the card 
indexes to insurance cases furnished by certain law publish- 
ing firms. 



ROOMS AND EQUIPMENT 29 

considerable vogue for many years, but of late this 
size card has been discarded by the only libraries 
of distinction which had clung to it. The printed 
cards of the Library of Congress, of the Konigliche 
Bibliothek of Berlin, and of the Concilium Bibli- 
ographicum of Zurich are all standard size. To 
this size all standard library card trays and cases 
conform, and any departure from it is likely to 
prove very expensive on that account. For ordi- 
nary cataloging work, then, the standard size card 
is without a rival. 

Weight and quality. In the earlier years of the 
card catalog a very heavy card was generally 
recommended on the ground that it was best suited 
to long use in public catalogs. Experience showed 
that there was no need of this excessive weight, if 
the quality of the paper was excellent, and a card 
of more moderate thickness has found favor during 
the last two decades. The Library of Congress 
printed cards are of linen rag cardboard of about 
the same weight as the '^ medium" weight cards of 
the best commercial supply houses. A number of 
libraries whose catalogs are not consulted by great 
numbers of people have long used a much lighter 
card of high quality, the so-called ''L" weight. 

The tests of a card are the cleanness and speed 
with which it "fingers" in consultation, and the 
fastness of its color. Card stock of a poor quality 
generally breaks or frays on the top edge under 



30 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

constant use. Because of this breaking down of 
the edge the tops of the cards retain dust and the 
cards frequently stick together. Hence a smooth, 
hard, and absolutely even top edge is indispensable. 
Any card which fails under wear at this point is 
dear, no matter at what cheap price it was bought. 
Experience proves that a good quality of card 
stock must be insisted on. Librarians have learned 
this thoroughly, and usually lean to the side of too 
good'^ rather than too poor card stock. 

Ruling. In the earlier days of card catalogs the 
ruling of the card was a matter much discussed. 
The need of uniformity in manuscript cards to be 
consulted rapidly was felt to warrant rather rigid 
insistence on uniform ruling and strictness in mat- 
ters of indenting and the like. At present, when 
the bulk of the cards are either printed or type- 
written, the ruling is hardly so important, as the 
alignment and spacing of printed or typewritten 
cards can readily be made accurate and uniform. 

* Cf . Library of Congress. Annual Report, 1905, p. 147- 
152, for a detailed discussion of the merits of the medium and 
light weight cards and for reports of experiments with both. 

Various claims are advanced by manufacturers of card 
stock with regard to their methods of cutting so as to leave 
an absolutely smooth and even top. Experience seems to 
point to the use of rotating knives as producing the best 
results both in the edge and in the accuracy of cutting. Of 
course absolute likeness in size is essential to quick consul- 
tation of catalog cards. 



ROOMS AND EQUIPMENT 31 

Manuscript cards should still be ruled with the top 
and two side lines in red, as of old. Typewritten 
cards will do well without any ruled lines at all, if 
copyists are trained to follow the proper model. ^ 

Guide Cards. Guide cards to aid the reader in 
finding his place in a catalog tray are usually made 
of bristol board. They are somewhat higher than 
the other cards in the tray, and as a rule the pro- 
jecting surface is but a third (or less) of the 
width of the card. Guide cards can now be 
bought with the legends printed and protected by 
celluloid. There are numerous other devices to 
strengthen the guide card and to prevent its 
wearing out. As a rule none of these are very 
satisfactory. In the nature of things guide cards 
must wear out quickly, and they should be re- 
newed frequently as a part of routine work and 
expense. They are seldom too numerous. In fact, 
there are seldom enough of them in large catalogs. 

In addition to the ordinary guide cards to aid in 
finding a given caption, it is highly desirable to 
insert explanatory guide cards before all compli- 
cated entries. If a subject is subdivided, the guide 
card should list the subdivisions; if an author entry 
requires explanation or elaboration, a guide card 
before the first author card gives the needed in- 
formation. These may well be of a different color 

5 On ink and copying ribbons, cf . below, p. 107. 



32 MODEKN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

from the ordinary bristol guide-cards. It is of 
course important that the legends should be brief, 
as they are practically sign-boards. Many such 
guides could be printed in advance and used (with 
different headings) for a variety of purposes. The 
various subdivisions employed under countries 
and the subheads used in subject catalogs under 
authors are examples. 



Chaptek III 

PLANNING THE CATALOG 

NUMBER AND KINDS OF CATALOGS 

Before entering on the actual work of cataloging 
it is necessary to determine in advance the number 
and kinds of catalogs to be maintained. Libra- 
rians have frequently failed to realize that in their 
routine processes they in effect make and keep up 
several sorts of catalogs. The kinds most com- 
monly in use are : (1) a catalog of accessions, (2) a 
catalog of classes of books (shelf -list), (3) a catalog 
of authors, (4) a catalog of subjects, (5) a catalog of 
titles. There may be in addition numerous dupli- 
cations of parts of any of these five. The number 
generally includes catalogs primarily for the use of 
the catalogers ^ 'official" catalog), or for the order 
clerks, and a catalog (or catalogs) for readers — the 
public catalog. It is obvious that if these are to 
differ in form, their number must become a very 
serious consideration. If, however, the same entry 
(card) can be used in all or most of them, and if 
it can be made once and duplicated ad libitum, the 
question of the number of catalogs maintained is 
much less serious. ^ It then becomes a matter of 

^ In the Library of Congress there are over 100 card cata- 
logs, large and small — all made of printed cards. 

Z8 



34 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

the expense of duplicating, of filing, and of cases. 
Obviously also, an adjustment of the various proc- 
esses of preparing the record of a book in the 
library may be devised which will enable the initial 
record to be duplicated cheaply and to be used in as 
many ways as are desirable. The economy effected 
by the single device of using the same form of entry 
for a given book throughout the institution, and 
having that entry determined once and for all 
early in the process is only to be understood by 
those who have encountered the vexatious delays 
and difficulties caused by varying records in differ- 
ent departments for a book of doubtful origin. 
Why an accession clerk, a shelf-lister, a cataloger, 
and a classifier — not to mention others — should in 
turn have to worry himself, and others, over the 
proper form of intricate or difficult entries (as they 
too frequently do) is one of the mysteries of bad 
management.'^ 

The adoption, then, of the principle of the ^' unit^' 
card and uniform rules of entry for various records 
will resolve in great measure the difficulties ex- 
perienced in keeping several catalogs. It should not 
be forgotten, however, whatever the number of 
catalogs determined on, that there are involved 
in the carrying out of this principle (1) some cheap 
mechanical process of duplicating cards, or the 

^ Cf. infraf ip. 5Q. 



PLANNING THE CATALOG 35 

possibility of purchasing them at a moderate cost, 
and (2) certain definite future expense for cases, 
floorspace and filing. Libraries are sure to grow 
year by year. Reference libraries wear out few 
books. The cost of future records in both space 
and money must be carefully counted.^ 

Official Catalog. There is one practical ques- 
tion which deserves attention at this point. 
Shall a small library keep an ^'official" catalog, 
that is, a catalog placed in the catalog room 
for the use of the catalogers and classifiers? 
Of course, if the library is very small, and is 
unlikely to grow large, especially if there be but 
one or two workers, an ofl&cial catalog is a bit 
of foolish extravagance. A library of fifty thou- 
sand volumes will perhaps hardly need one. But if 
the library be part of an institution of learning, of 
research, whether purely practical or theoretical, 
if it is to have a continuous existence and growth, 
an official catalog had better be started early — even 
when it may seem an absurdity. The time saved 
to the cataloging force, the helpful aid to continuity 
and consistency which the opportunity to insert 
all sorts of catalogers' notes and directions affords, 
the comparatively trifling expense of maintenance, 
all point in the direction of establishing such an 

^ Cf . my articles in Library Journal, v. 30, p. lG-14, and 
V. 31, p. 270-271, on ''The cost of cataloging," and ''The 
number of catalog cards to a book." 



36 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

office record. In a large library there can be no 
possible question that an official catalog saves time 
and money, insures uniformity of treatment, and is 
the means of avoiding much serious trouble. In- 
cidentally also the fact that it saves catalogers 
from continual consultation and even occasional 
monopolization of the public catalog is an item of 
no small moment. Everyone has seen public cata- 
logs thronged by catalogers to the point of inter- 
fering with the convenience of readers. When 
there is no official catalog this interference may, and 
probably will, become a charge against the adminis- 
tration of the library, to say nothing of the waste 
of the cataloger's time in going from the cataloging 
room to the public catalog. 

Full or Short Catalogs. In the days when all 
the cards for the various catalogs were made 
by one cataloger there was much discussion of 
full entries and of short and simple entries. 
The question is still occasionally raised, espe- 
cially in libraries chiefly devoted to the circula- 
tion of popular books, and may well be studied 
by all catalogers. The decision of the Ameri- 
can Library Association committee to leave the 
cataloger no liberty as regards the title-page 
has never commended itself to many students of 
cataloging practice. In fact, the fine art of cata- 
loging lies in large part in the proper abridgment 
of the title. Wheitbe^ the fuU deftails of (^IMnxm 



PLANNING THE CATALOG 37 

are desirable for every library is likewise a matter 
of doubt. No librarian, as some have mistakenly 
thought, is barred from making a decision on these 
matters by the fact that he buys and uses printed 
cards in his catalog. On the contrary, he may, and 
indeed must, decide how far the needs of his pa.r- 
ticular institution demand the complete bibli- 
ographic description of a book, and what elements 
he may with safety omit. Of course he can not 
use printed cards successfully in his catalog if he 
does not ordinarily make his ''main entries" accord- 
ing to code. Other matters he may determine for 
himself without undue contrast. 

While these questions are discussed in some detail 
in a later chapter,* it may be well to remark here 
that the date and place of publication and the pub- 
lisher's name are not wisely omitted in any library 
frequented by specialists in any field. Neither are 
the notes of illustrations, maps, and plans, nor the 
number of pages and volumes. These are all items 
of moment to one selecting a book from a catalog. 
The needs of his readers will necessarily govern the 
librarian's decision. The best principle to follow is 
to err on the side of fullness, if the library is to grow. 
Information which easily differentiates somewhat 
similar books or editions in a small collection will 
often be wholly insufficient in a large library. The 

*Cf.p.92-95. 



38 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

much-vexed matter of full names is a case in point. 
In a library of, say, fifty thousand volumes which 
consists largely of the writings of contemporary 
authors there will not be any great confusion arising 
from identical or apparently identical names. But 
in a library which has passed — or will pass — that 
figure, there will constantly come up cases of the 
same surname, the same ordinarily used given 
name, or the same initials. Differentiation is 
obviously needed. In the full name of each writer it 
is ordinarily sought and found without the uncom- 
fortable expedients of dates and epithets, defini- 
tions and " floruits. ^^ Insistence on full names, 
which so often seems pedantry and which so easily 
excites the cheap wit of the captious critic, is in 
reality the fruit of bitter experience. How much 
greater would be the ire of the man who now rails 
at the meticulousness of catalogers, if he should 
find no adequate distinction in the catalog between 
the array of men who have rejoiced in the names of 
John Smith or Wilhelm Mtiller, other than at- 
tempted dates or designations. Here is where the 
three and four Christian names do yeoman service 
in the cause of accuracy. 

In arriving at a decision, therefore, the probable 
future development of the collection must be the 
guiding consideration. On the other hand it must 
not be forgotten that a decision to be ''full" may 
involve expense which may be needless and which 



PLANNING THE CATALOG 39 

must be incurred with every book and pamphlet 
cataloged. Experience has shown that a mean 
between very full and very short catalogs is attain- 
able with intelligent direction and good, well- 
trained catalogers. A changing force working on 
a large collection can not be held to this mean with 
success. 

The amount of time consumed in noting the de- 
tails of collation is generally held to be a more 
serious argument against the full catalog than any 
supposed lack of demand for the information when 
supplied. But it is very doubtful whether this 
objection is valid under modern conditions. The 
time and labor spent in determining the proper 
form of entries, both author and subject (fre- 
quently from a lengthy and minute consultation 
of authorities), are usually far in excess of that 
needed for setting down the other details, since 
these last are almost always to be obtained from 
the book itself. If, now, the American Library 
Association code be followed, and if in addition 
there is kept a file of Library of Congress cards or 
proofsheets, the proper form of entry for puzzling 
books is determined very rapidly; even when there 
is no printed card for the book in hand, there are 
frequently cards for other works of the same author. 
Some favorite hobbies of entry must of course be 
abandoned in following the Library of Congress 
form of entry. But the time thus set free for work 



40 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

on other features, i.e., added entries (including sub- 
jects), collation, and notes, makes possible a good 
grade of ''home-made" card which would have 
been impractical because of pressure of work in 
very many libraries a decade since. 

FORMS OP CATALOGS 

Dictionary catalog. There are three forms of 
catalogs for the public in use in American libraries, 
the dictionary catalog, the classed catalog, and the 
alphabetic-classed catalog. In the dictionary cata- 
log which is the form in use in an overwhelming ma- 
jority of libraries, author, title, and subject entries 
are arranged in one alphabet, exactly as are the 
words in an ordinary dictionary. Further, with 
a very few exceptions, the sub-arrangement is 
strictly alphabetical. Theoretically this arrange- 
ment on a strictly alphabetical basis is simple and 
easily understood. It is claimed that even the 
tyro can use a dictionary card catalog with both 
ease and success. This is undoubtedly true in the 
smaller libraries. Even in the larger ones, in which 
intricate author and subject entries, as well as 
extremely large numbers of cards under certain 
headings, present obstacles to the successful work- 
ing of the principle of alphabetic arrangement, this 
principle is, nevertheless, on the whole the most 
successful yet invented. There is an immense 



PLANNING THE CATALOG 41 

advantage in the collocation of author and subject 
when these happen to be the same, as in such a 
heading as Dante, or any other man of letters. 
There is great convenience, too, in finding the publi- 
cations of any corporate body, as for example, the 
city of New York, in juxtaposition with works 
about that particular body or locality. It is too 
much, however, to expect that because the diction- 
ary form of arrangement is comparatively simple 
that it will of itself be intelligible to untrained per- 
sons. In the smallest libraries it is well to supple- 
ment the catalog with every device to render it 
self -interpreting, not omitting such elementary aids 
as plenty of guide-cards, labels, and notes explana- 
tory of arrangement. In large libraries some per- 
sonal assistance must almost necessarily be rendered 
to readers desirous of ferreting out obscure and 
hidden items. If a separate room is provided for 
the public catalog, there will have to be attendants. 
It is evident that they must be versed not only in 
the rules of cataloging and of filing, but also in the 
use of printed bibliographies and catalogs as sub- 
stitutes and helps to the card catalog. It is useful 
to have certain members of the cataloging staff 
detailed to serve as attendants in the catalog room, 
both because of their familiarity with the making 
of catalogs, and for the reflex effect on their work in 
cataloging. 

Most American libraries follow Mr. Cutter's 



42 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

rules for the arrangement of a dictionary catalog 
found in the fourth edition of his Rules, p. 111-129.^ 

Classed catalog. The classed catalog, or ''cata- 
logue raisonne^^ as it was termed in the earlier 
works, is less frequently met with in American libra- 
ries. Most libraries, however, prepare a shelf-list, 
which is substantially the same thing as a classed 
catalog. The shelf -list does not ordinarily con- 
tain the cross-references which will be found in a 
good classed catalog, although such additional 
entries would strengthen a shelf-list which was 
designed only for the use of the classifiers. There 
has never been any very strong reason for the fail- 
ure of most libraries to duplicate their shelf-lists 
for the benefit of the public, or at least to make 
them as fully accessible as the other card catalogs. 
With the advent of the printed cards such duplica- 
tion is not only possible at a moderate cost, but 
from every point of view highly desirable. 

A classed catalog will show at a glance exactly 

5 On the dictionary catalog, cf . the papers by Barrett and 
Pollard, Second International Conference of Librarians, 
London, 1897, pp. 67 and 63 respectively; W. E. Doubleday, 
Class lists or dictionary catalogs? Library, 9: 179; Charles 
A. Cutter, Why and how a dictionary catalog is made. 
Library Journal, 15: 143; E. W. Hulme, Principles of dic- 
tionary subject cataloging in scientific and technical libra- 
ries. Library Association Record, 2: 551, 571, 668; A. B. 
Kroeger, Dictionary catalogs versus bibliographies, Library 
Journal, 27: Conf. 180. 



PLANNING THE CATALOG 43 

what books are grouped on the shelves under any 
topic or subdivision of a topic. It is necessarily 
arranged in the exact order of the library's classi- 
fication. When there are numerous divisions in 
the collections, as the seminar and laboratory 
libraries in our large universities, or the branches 
of a large public library, the classed catalog will 
reveal more fully and accurately the library's real 
strength on any one topic than will an examination 
of the shelves. A ''union shelf -list," which is 
practically a classified catalog, becomes a vitally 
important tool under such conditions. 

There are certain advantages of a technical sort 
in the classed catalog. The classification has to be 
done anyhow, and the preparation of a subject 
catalog arranged by classes is but a slight additional 
burden on the classifying force. To one familiar 
with the scheme of arrangement adopted it affords 
a means for an easy survey of a comparatively wide 
field, as he finds the various allied topics in close 
proximity and not scattered throughout the alpha- 
bet according to the accidents of terminology. 

From the practical point of view of the librarian 
who must make a decision between the alphabetic 
principle of setting forth the contents of his books 
and the logical arrangement of titles it makes but 
little difference which form is chosen. It is abso- 
lutely necessary to supplement any classed catalog 
with an alphabetical index, unless all the persons 



44 MODEKN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

who consult the catalog are versed in the niceties 
of classification. It is likewise almost as essential 
to set out before investigators a detailed scheme of 
the arrangement of books in the library and the 
actual titles under the several heads. In other 
words, if the classed catalog is made the basis for 
the subject index of the library's contents, there 
must be an alphabetic key to the system; while a 
merely alphabetic index gives no adequate notion of 
the contents of the library in closely related fields. 
Practically, then, an author and subject catalog 
arranged alphabetically, plus a duplication of the 
shelf-list, gives the most effective clue to the con- 
tents of the library. That is, a dictionary catalog 
requires supplementing by class lists, a classed 
catalog by an alphabetical index of subjects. 

Just what form the classed catalog which is to be 
used to supplement the ordinary dictionary catalog 
shall take is a matter to be determined by each 
library adopting it in accordance with its particular 
problems. Perhaps small sections of the classed 
catalog scattered through the library, in the im- 
mediate vicinity of the books listed, for the con- 
venience of persons having direct access to the 
books, such as class lists of special collections, may 
prove useful. Small book finding-lists in classed 
form with alphabetic index are a most convenient 
device, though they involve a departure from the 
card principle. The so-called '' title-a-line " classed 



PLANNING THE CATALOG 45 

lists which have been issued by the Princeton Uni- 
versity Library in book form offer a unique solution 
of the problem of combining compactness, fresh- 
ness, and low cost. In libraries which are not too 
large, it is possible to combine card shelf or class 
lists of the various subjects with each group of 
reference books in the reference room. Thus a 
reader having at hand a selection of the library's 
best and most recent treatises on a given subject 
may find also a complete list of what the library 
has on its shelves on the same topics. In this way 
the half dozen books which do duty in the reference 
collection may have as a support a list of some 
hundreds which the reader may call for. This 
scheme demands the planning of a reference room 
so that card trays may be furnished in immediate 
proximity to each set of shelves.^ 

Alphabetic-classed catalog. In addition to the 
strictly classified catalog which follows in detail 
the notation of the classification in use in the library 
there is sometimes employed an alphabetical ar- 

« Cf . H. Bond. Classified vs. dictionary catalogues, 
Ldbrary Association Record, 2: 313-318; A. W. Pollard. 
Meditations on directories: alphabetical and classed cata- 
loguing, The Library (New Series) 2: 82-90.; J. H. Quinn. 
Dictionary vs. classified catalogues for Public Libraries — 
The classified catalogue, Library Association Record, 3: 
314-^20; W.I. Fleftcher, Future of the catalog, L^ra^y Jour- 
«feL30: 141-4. 



46 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

rangement of titles under the headings of large 
classes of books. This method has the advantage 
of not being subject to change in arrangement with 
the development of the classification and the conse- 
quent inevitable change of notation, while it still 
retains the advantage of the systematic arrange- 
ment. It is the true "catalogue raisonne^' disposed 
in alphabetical order. The use of inversion keeps 
related subjects together, while the call numbers 
appearing in the customary place are an indication 
of the location of the books and not a guide to the 
arrangement of the catalog. In such a catalog Bot- 
any is found (with a variety of sub-headings) under 
the letter B, while Zoology comes under Z, and 
both headings may contain cards for books which 
are located in parts of the library's collections re- 
moved from either class. Such an arrangement 
differs from that of the ordinary dictionary catalog 
chiefly in that it generally includes under each main 
head a larger variety of sub-heads, i.e., it is a group- 
ing of titles by class, rather than by specific subject. 
Such an alphabetical classed catalog does not, of 
course, require an index as a strictly classed catalog 
does, nor does it involve so much movement in 
consultation as a strictly dictionary catalog. It 
is best adapted to small collections. In a large 
library the subjects become so unwieldy that even 
minute and very specific headings come to have an 
unduly large number of cards under each, whether 



PLANNING THE CATALOG 47 

those headings be treated as divisions of the classi- 
fication or as separate subject entries. The alpha- 
betically arranged classified catalog is not, there- 
fore, much in favor in progressive library circles 
for large collections. 

Arrangement. Before leaving this topic, it may 
be remarked that the dictionary catalog principle 
of specific headings may be followed successfully 
without filing the author, title, and subject cards 
in one alphabet. If it appears desirable to keep 
an author record separate from the subject record, 
it may be done without any departure from the 
basic principle of the dictionary catalog. In some 
institutions, in which the catalog is consulted very 
much more often to discover whether a certain 
book is in the library than to find what the library 
has on a particular topic, there is no small practical 
convenience in keeping the two apart. In that 
case it is perhaps well to keep biographical and 
critical works in the author catalog under the name 
of the subject, as is done in the British Museum 
Catalogue, or to insert them in the title catalog, if 
a separate catalog of titles is maintained. 

DECISION 

The majority of American libraries have card 
catalogs on the dictionary plan of arrangement. It 
is probably the cheapest form to make and to file, 



48 MODERN LIBEARY CATALOGING 

especially with the aid of the purchased printed 
card. The average reader undoubtedly finds his 
book in the dictionary catalog more easily than in 
any other kind. The dictionary form, then, may 
be taken as the norm for libraries of general interest. 

This being granted, it becomes the librarian's 
duty to supplement the general catalog in every 
way possible within his means, either by lists of 
certain classes, selected lists of the best books on 
certain topics, or complete class-lists. The Library 
of Congress has a dictionary catalog, and supple- 
ments it by numerous select lists on special topics, 
and by bibliographies showing completely its re- 
sources in certain fields. Its shelf-lists will also 
ultimately be available to the public. The John 
Crerar Library has a classed catalog, and has pub- 
lished some very valuable lists showing its resources 
in particular fields, as Bibliographies of special sub- 
jects, Encyclopaedias, History of Sciences, etc. 

When the resources of the library do not permit 
publication in book form, they generally allow 
either duplication of card shelf -lists, or direct access 
to them. At all events, almost any library can now 
afford to make by means of (printed) cards select 
lists on topics of particular interest in its own com- 
munity. Whether these lists are arranged by classes 
or not is a matter of comparative indifference. 

Whatever decision is reached, the cost of keeping 
up the main catalog and its supplements must al- 



PLANNING THE CATALOG 49 

ways be in mind. This cost, as was said in the 
beginning of this chapter, is not alone that of 
manufacture — it includes space, filing, and main- 
tenance. To make fully available whatever work 
is done is as important as to undertake new projects. 



Chapter IV 
ORGANIZATION OF THE CATALOGING FORCE 

The organization of the cataloging force will 
naturally vary with the number of catalogers, 
the character of the library, the degree of minute- 
ness of the work, etc. Even when the force 
is very small, it is well to have definite responsi- 
bilities for each member, and a careful division of 
the work. Certain classes of decisions — and all 
cataloging work, aside from mere duplicating, con- 
sists of decisions — should be left to the librarian 
in a small library. For example, whenever the 
rules prescribe the following of the ''best known 
form" of name, or give similar doubtful direc- 
tions the decision should be put up to the head 
librarian, if for no other reason, that he may not 
be ignorant of the library's practice in dubious 
matters. In larger libraries he will not, in all 
probability, have time to devote to such details, 
but will transfer the responsibility to the head 
cataloger. 

Head cataloger. Whenever there are two or 
more catalogers, one must be given the place of 
authority. As soon as the force increases to half a 
dozen or more, definite subdivision of the work and 
consequent organization will be essential. The 

50 



OKGANIZATION OF THE CATALOGING FORCE 51 

head cataloger must necessarily lay out the work 
for his force, revise some portions of it, and main- 
tain a close general supervision. It will be found 
possible, by the use of the Library of Congress 
printed cards as authority in matters of entry, to 
diminish much of the work done of old by head cata- 
logers in determining author entries. Any reliable 
cataloger can ascertain the form already adopted 
in conformity with the American Library Associa- 
tion rules in the Library of Congress catalog, and 
can indicate it for the rest of the force by checking 
the titlepage.. This will dispose of a very large por- 
tion of the work of deciding on main entries, and 
will enable the head cataloger to use the time thus 
freed for careful revision of the work of his sub- 
ordinates, particularly in the field of subject cata- 
loging where experience and knowledge count for 
so much. It should be the rule of the library that 
every subject heading should be passed on finally 
by the head cataloger, or his chief assistant. An- 
other very common rule is that all work when com- 
pleted shall come to him for final inspection. 

Revision. Revision of preliminary work should 
be rigidly insisted on, and revision of all copying 
work must necessarily be a part of cataloging rou- 
tine. ^ No card should go into the catalog which 

* It is this necessity for revision of the copying which con- 
sumes so much time and strength that has led to various 
efforts to have cataloging done directly on the flexotype, 



52 MODERN LIBRAEY CATALOGING 

has not been scrutinized by another than the person 
who made it. This rule should apply to any cards 
made by the head cataloger as well as to those of 
his subordinates. Indeed, the better the chief, the 
more likely is his semi-clerical work to stand in 
need of scanning by another. He may have lost 
his skill in tithing the mint, anise and cummin of 
necessary minutiae in the effort to manage a force 
almost always insufficient for the work and to get 
proper headings for all his books. 

Assignment and specializing. Cataloging calls 
for a service of varying degrees of knowledge. 
Much of the work is clerical — some of it is even 

linotype, or some other machine which can be at once ap- 
plied to duplication, with but one revision, i.e. the reading 
of one proof. Certain persons have thought it possible to 
go farther and eliminate all copying and consequent revision 
by using some form of photographic process to reproduce 
on a standard size, sensitized plate an impression from 
which printing can be done. Another possibility may per- 
haps lie in the direction of photographing a titlepage di- 
rectly on a sensitized paper of proper size and thickness 
which can be used as a catalog card. However, these at- 
tractive schemes have not as yet been reduced to prac- 
ticality, although the flexotype and similar forms of inex- 
pensive typesetting and duplicating machinery effect a 
great saving in comparatively simple cataloging work, and 
may well be introduced in libraries having any considerable 
amount of direct and simple cataloging. When once the 
element of time in preparation becomes of more moment 
than time in reproduction, the value of such machines 
diminishes. 



ORGANIZATION OF THE CATALOGING FORCE 53 

manual, as the pasting on of labels. At the other 
end of the scale is the need for linguistic ability, 
bibliographic training, competent judgment on 
recondite subjects. An improper organization of 
the force will compel the man who uses half a dozen 
languages and knows the literature of as many 
subjects to do the work of a typewriter or a mere 
clerk, or on the other hand will permit a recent 
high school graduate to decide the subject entry 
for the latest physical chemistry or treatise on 
elliptic functions. Good cataloging costs money. 
Cheap cataloging is always expensive in the end. 
The librarian and the head cataloger between them 
must therefore fit the force to the work so as to 
use skilled labor to the best advantage, and not to 
waste it. 

It is impossible to lay down fixed rules for the 
details of organization of a department which 
must necessarily vary with each institution and 
its needs. If the principles noted above, definite 
responsibility, careful assignment of duties, and 
unceasing revision are followed, the work can not 
well go wrong. 

Statistics. Reports of the total work done in 
each cataloging force should be required by the 
library management. These can best be compiled 
from the reports of the individual catalogers to their 
immediate chief. As a rule these are made on 
blank forms of the size of a standard card. 



54 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

The minimum on which reports should be re- 
quired seems to be: (1) number of main entry 
cards; (2) number of added entries indicated or 
made; (3) number of " analy ticals " and cards 
involved; (4) number of former entries investi- 
gated; (5) amount of revision. Catalogers can 
keep the account day by day and hand in the re- 
ports as desired, either weekly or monthly. 

It is manifestly unfair to the catalogers, as most 
of our libraries go, to make these reports the basis 
of comparison between individuals. The work is 
never of the same difficulty, the same duration, 
the same amount. No one sits at a desk day by 
day, hour by hour, turning out catalog cards. The 
very nature of the work demands a great variety 
of study and time on different books. One may 
prove a problem which requires hours of investi- 
gation, comparison of authorities, balanced judg- 
ment, consultation of numerous precedents in the 
library's practice. For another book equally 
difficult of decision the Library of Congress card 
file may give the proper form with but a moment's 
labor. In any library, catalogers having special 
equipment may be called on — and should be — to 
aid in reference work. Moreover, the person 
assigning work can directly influence the record of 
the individual cataloger by the nature of that 
assignment. The time expended in the revision 



ORGANIZATION OF THE CATALOGING FORCE 55 

of the work of a careless colleague will of course 
cause the reviser's output to dwindle. The reports 
are decidedly valuable in recording the sum of the 
work done, in estimating the probable capacity 
of the office. They are seldom, even when taken 
for long periods, a true reflection of the cataloging 
ability of the various members of the force.^ 

Budget. The portion of the income of the library i 
which may properly be devoted to the work of cata- i^ 
loging is primarily a matter of general administra- 
tion. At this point, it may, however, be remarked 
that the quality of the cataloging work, as well as 
its quantity, demands consideration. Poorly paid 
catalogers produce catalogs badly made, badly 
revised, incomplete and inconsistent. The work 
of every user of the library is rendered less effective 

2 For example, I recall that six books in an unknown 
tongue once fell to my lot to catalog. There was on the title- 
pages absolutely no clue to the language. The imprint was 
finally discovered to be Copenhagen. By a process of 
elimination lasting several hours, it was at length decided 
that they must be in some American language. They 
proved to be books in Eskimo printed by the Danish mis- 
sionaries to Greenland in the late eighteenth century, but 
it took the spare time of several days and much consultation 
of dictionaries of the modern Alaskan Innuit to arrive at an 
approximation to a translation of the titlepages and the 
consequent classification and cataloging. 

How many English or American novels could have been 
done in that time? 



56 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

as a consequence, and the reputation of the institu- 
tion deservedly suffers. The time of the higher 
salaried employees is frequently all but consumed 
in an effort to atone for and revise errors and blun- 
ders. A catalog department must of course be 
so organized as to make every use of modern cooper- 
ative methods, of mechanical duplication, of time- 
and labor-saving devices. The head and his aids 
must discriminate between needless refinements of 
collation and notes and the essential elements in 
the description of a book. Even so, the cost will 
be heavy, and there is always a tendency — more 
pronounced in these days of library extension — to 
cut the cataloging cost at the expense of ultimate 
efficiency. If the various processes of preparing a 
book for the shelves are so ordered and correlated 
that entry is determined at the beginning, descrip- 
tion once made is mechanically repeated in other 
records, the apparent cost will produce a real sav- 
ing. In other words, cataloging should precede 
accessioning, shelf -listing, classifying, binding. The 
simplifying of those processes which will result 
is much greater than would be supposed by those 
who have followed each in turn separately from the 
others. When the question, ''How shall this book 
be entered?" is decided, much of the mental effort 
now given to the making of various records disap- 
pears, to say nothing of the practical value in 
shortening labor of the notes, series entries, refer- 



ORGANIZATION OP THE CATALOGING FORCE 57 

ences, included on the card or added to the title- 
page.^ 

Cataloging is in a transition period at the present 
time. The proportion of the total income needed 
for this work is certainly in excess of what it will be 
when all cards can be got when the books are 
bought. In the meantime it is foolish to cut ap- 
propriations severely for the sake of entering more 
attractive fields. 

QUALIFICATIONS 

Accuracy. The conditions under which cata- 
loging work must be done vary to such a degree 
that it is almost impossible to lay down even 
minimum requirements. Even more difiicult is it 
to divine from standards set up and from recom- 
mendations of candidates the one underlying and 
essential characteristic — accuracy. No amount of 
training and no extent of study can make a person 
of an habitually inaccurate turn of mind a good 
cataloger. Accuracy in transcribing, in compiling 
notes of authorities, in copying, in everything, in 
short, is the sine qua non of success. Accuracy or 

3 On the cost of cataloging see my articles (previously 
cited) in Library Journal, v. 30, p. 10-14, v. 31, p. 270-271, 
in which it is shown that cataloging costs can be figured 
in time and results, but hardly in money, as not only do 
salaries vary, but the kinds of work other than cataloging, 
strictly so-called, done by the various employees vary 
greatly in different institutions. 



58 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

its reverse are more truly matters of habit and 
disposition than of training. An accurate and 
exact temperament is more to be sought for in 
prospective catalogers than any other one thing. 

Certain minimum requirements almost go with- 
out saying. For even the minor positions at least 
a high school education plus some sort of training 
is necessarily demanded. As one goes up on the 
scale of positions, the requirements naturally rise. 
Competent catalogers in libraries of the scholarly 
type must have had college training and in addition 
either a good library school course or careful in- 
struction in a good library. The higher work — 
particularly that of revision — demands a man or 
woman of scholarly attainments, knowledge of 
several languages, and more than a modicum of 
both training and experience. 

Linguistic ability is more than ever needed. In 
these days of rapid growth of libraries even the 
public libraries maintained by the cities contain 
numerous books in German and French, and many 
have large numbers both in the ancient languages 
and in those of eastern and southern Europe. The 
number of books in languages other than English 
is almost certain to increase. A cataloger who can 
be used only on plain work in English becomes less 
useful as the years go on. 

At present such catalogers, if they profit by ex- 
perience, will doubtless continue in their work be- 



ORGANIZATION OF THE CATALOGING FORCE 59 

cause of the value of this very experience. But 
persons expecting to enter on cataloging work 
should acquire a good reading knowledge of French 
and German as a minimum, and will do well to add 
to it as much as they can learn of other languages. 

General information. To linguistic ability one 
may add that baffling qualification — general infor- 
mation. This is supposed to be evidenced by the 
number of years that have been spent in school or 
college. As a matter of fact the length of time thus 
spent is no indication whatever of the mental atti- 
tude of a candidate. Some experience of the world 
of people as distinct from that of books is no mean 
help in cataloging books — for people. A librarian 
seeking a new cataloger will do very well to ask 
about the attitude of the various candidates toward 
people and things — about general information and 
savoir faire. Naturally he must ask people who 
know. Consequently he can not ask the candi- 
dates. Some of their "references" will generally, 
however, be in a position to give a discriminating 
opinion. 

"Book-sense." Another quahty which defies defi- 
nition and is equally hard to discover in advance 
may be termed "book-sense." To some people 
* books are books" — and nothing more. Bookish- 
ness is generally offensive in itself and of very little 
aid in cataloging or reference work. But "book- 
sense," if the term may be allowed, is something 



k 



60 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

very different from bookishness. It is an ability 
to move quickly and easily among printed things 
with an instinctive appreciation of values. It 
comes to people who have lived with books from 
childhood but who have never regarded them as an 
end in themselves. A man or woman without 
"book-sense" is utterly out of place in a library. 
Some people never get it — they had best go to sell- 
ing groceries or pounding typewriters. This qual- 
ity must be sought for — but there is no way of 
putting it into application blanks. Again resort 
must be had to the discriminating person who 
knows the candidate. 

Library schools. This leads naturally to men- 
tion of the work of the library schools. Librarians 
are looking more and more to these institutions 
for trained helpers, particularly in cataloging. 
They do not, however, all teach cataloging equally 
well. There is a great difference in the theory that 
is taught, the amount of practice work done, and 
in the quality of the instruction in cataloging. 
Much more varied is the work of apprentice 
classes, which seldom go beyond the mere mechan- 
ical rudiments of cataloging. It will not do to 
take the mere fact of some professional training 
without scrutiny — at least in the somewhat un- 
formed condition of our present means for afford- 
ing training in librarianship. 

The whole matter, then, of qualifications for 



ORGANIZATION OF THE CATALOGING FORCE 61 

catalogers resolves itself into two elements — the 
qualifications which can be put on paper by an 
applicant and those which can not. There will be 
a certain minimum of the first which must be re- 
quired of all candidates, rising with the complexity 
of the work and the nature of the library. The 
qualifications of the second class must be ascer- 
tained by report of trusted persons or by observa- 
tion. A probationary period for newly appointed 
assistants would seem, therefore, an essential part 
of a library's organization. 

SALARIES 

What salaries can good catalogers command? 
This is wholly a relative matter — not one to which 
a positive answer can be given. The varying cost of 
living in different sections, the general divergences 
between salaries in city and country come in to pre- 
vent definiteness. If the library has a scheme of 
classification of its service which provides for pro- 
motion from one grade to another with satisfactory 
service of a given length, the catalogers will not 
come low in the scale. The value of successful 
experience will of course be recognized in such a 
scheme, in addition to preliminary training. There 
will be junior and senior catalogers, and assistants 
of various grades. At present, so far as can be 
learned from somewhat extensive inquiry, heads of 
catalog departments receive salaries varying from 



62 MODEEN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

$1200 to $3000 in different types and grades of 
libraries. Senior catalogers with good training and 
long experience range from $900 to $2400, while 
juniors receive from $600 to $1200. The variety 
in work, institutions, scale of salaries and of living 
is thus evident. Few institutions of any consider- 
able size pay the smallest sums quoted, and equally 
few the largest. The average is probably about 
$1800 for head of the catalog work, $1200 for senior 
catalogers, and $800 for junior catalogers. 

HOURS 

Seven hours daily is usually regarded as the 
maximum of successful cataloging work. Beyond 
that amount come in eye-strain, physical fatigue, 
loss of judgment to hinder a satisfactory output. 
The quality of the work suffers severely, if a longer 
day is attempted. Indeed it is such a well known 
fact of psychology that accuracy and judgment fail 
with fatigue that many librarians deliberately vary 
the cataloger's work. In some libraries the change 
comes in substituting another sort of work for a 
portion of each day. In others the variety is 
attained by transferring catalogers to other de- 
partments for a portion of each year. It is highly 
advisable that a certain amount of service in refer- 
ence work be given catalogers wherever it is prac- 
tical. The reaction on the cataloging work is 
generally very helpful. 



Chapter V 
THE USE OF PRINTED CATALOG CARDS 

The two kinds of modern cataloging practice. 

Catalogs were formerly made by each institution 
for itself. Today over 50 per cent of the cards 
needed for an American university library, and 
nearly 90 per cent of those for a public library can 
be purchased and adapted to the needs of the indi- 
vidual library. The methods of this adaptation 
are discussed in this chapter. Each year the per- 
centage of cards available grows — perhaps in a 
decade the need for making more than a small 
number of cards will have passed with the develop- 
ment of the various agencies for manufacturing 
card entries for both new and old books. 

The need at present for skill in cataloging in 
the library is still so great that Chapter VI is 
devoted to a consideration of some of the guiding 
principles of that work. In a comparatively short 
time, however, much of the time and money now 
necessarily given to cataloging can be freed to a 
large extent by the purchase of cards for each book 
added to the library's collections. 

Catalog rules. The use of printed cards from a 
central source of course implies the adoption of 
identical rules of cataloging. The American Li- 

63 



A 



64 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

brary Association therefore in 1900 appointed a 
committee on cataloging rules which worked for 
several years at this problem, joining finally with 
a similar committee of the Library Association of 
the United Kingdom in issuing "Catalog rules: 
author and title entries. Boston, 1908." This 
code is largely followed in American libraries, and 
as the basis for the preparation of the Library of 
Congress printed cards should be generally adopted 
by libraries engaged in making new catalogs or 
remodeling old ones. It is of course possible for 
a library which has not adopted the code of 1908 to 
use the printed cards to some extent without en- 
gaging in extensive alterations or changes of old 
entries. The fullest benefit, however, can only be 
gained by following the same rules in purchased and 
"home-made" entries. 

If an international agreement of wider scope is 
ever reached, it will probably not be necessary to 
make very extensive changes in existing catalogs, 
just because the printed cards have purposely been 
made with sufficient space between the top and the 
heading to permit the writing in of different forms 
of entry. 

Cards. The standard size card, approximately 
5 by 3 inches (12.5 x 7.5 cm.) is now used exclusively. 
Odd sizes (which seem to have an irresistible fasci- 
nation for the amateur) are' in catalogs a positive 
harm, as they prevent the adoption of printed 



PRINTED CATALOG CARDS 65 

cards for use in the same catalog. The thinner 
cards are now much more used than formerly. 
Cheap card stock does not hold its color well nor 
take a lasting ink with good results and moreover it 
is likely to break on top and to be cut unevenly; it 
is therefore advisable to use high grade linen card- 
board. The Library of Congress cards are of 
medium thickness and of excellent white stock, to 
which it is desirable that the other cards in the cata- 
log should conform as nearly as possible. 

PRINTED CARDS 'FROM THE LIBRARY OF 
CONGRESS 

In planning to make as full use as possible of the 
printed cards from the Library of Congress the 
beginner will find it indispensable to study thor- 
oughly the Handbook of Card Distribution and the 
Bulletins of the Card Section as well as the pam- 
phlet ^^ Library of Congress Printed Cards; How to 
order and use them, by C. H. Hastings. Washing- 
ton, Govt. Print. Office, 1914." These may be 
obtained by writing to the Librarian of Congress. 
It would perhaps be well to correspond with the 
Card Section of the Library before beginning to 
work out a method of using the cards in a ''special" 
or a small library. 

Number of cards to be ordered. In any case 
the librarian should determine in advance as well 
as may be the various uses to which he can profit- 



66 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

ably put Library of Congress cards. Of course, he 
must consider that ordinarily he will have to make 
the same number of cards himself to represent 
books for which he can not obtain printed cards. 
If he has no cheap means of duplicating entries this 
is a very serious matter. Cards can well be used 
for (1) main entry, (2) a varying number of added 
entries (subjects, titles, references, editor and trans- 
lator cards, etc.), (3) entry in official catalog, (4) 
shelf-lists, (5) departmental or special catalogs. 
In libraries devoted to specialties there may well be 
other uses, and in libraries having many branches 
or departments, there will naturally be a larger 
number of copies for the various catalogs. He 
should also determine how far he can use cards for 
slightly varying editions, imprints, etc., although 
this must naturally be a matter which will settle 
itself practically as the system comes into operation. 
Ordering. The chief difficulty in using Library 
of Congress cards lies in the process of ordering 
them. Each year the stock of available cards in- 
creases by from 50,000 to 55,000 titles, and there 
are now (1914) over 650,000 titles in stock. As all 
are stored and arranged by their serial number, the 
cheapest and most rapid method of picking them out 
is by means of an order bearing this number. Ac- 
cordingly the minimum charge (two cents each) is 
made for orders by number of the cards. This 
number may be obtained in various ways. There 
are depository sets of the entire stock of printed 



PKINTED CATALOG CARDS 67 

cards in most of the larger cities in the country. By 
consulting one of these files it is possible to ascertain 
definitely that a card has been printed for a given 
book and to note its number. Certain libraries 
which are not depositories or subscribers to the 
entire set of printed cards subscribe to the cards 
covering certain subjects, as American history. 
Still others purchase (for about $30 a year) a com- 
plete set of the manila paper proofsheets of the 
cards as issued, cut them up (they cut readily to 
card size), and file them. In this way a complete 
or partial set may be obtained at a slight initial 
cost, plus a moderate labor cost. There is some 
additional advantage in the saving of space over 
that occupied by the cards, which are of course 
thicker. But the manila paper slips are not 
handled or consulted as readily as cards. While the 
bibliographical value of such a list is its chief ad- 
vantage, the facility with which desired card num- 
bers may be secured adds greatly to its usefulness. 
The process of securing the card number by a 
search of the file of cards or proof slips is laborious, 
but it has several advantages; First, the element of 
uncertainty as to whether cards may be had is 
thus removed in a very great percent of the books 
to be cataloged. There will occur cases of books 
not represented in the file by cards which are just 
being cataloged at Washington at the time the file 
is consulted, but these cases are not numerous for 
the average library. Secmidy the number of subject 



68 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

and reference cards needed is definitely ascertained ; 
Third J the cost of the cards is slightly lessened by 
ordering by number; Fourth, and most important; 
even if a card for the particular work is not found 
in the printed card file, frequently there are found 
cards for other works by the same author, and the 
proper entry is thereby determined without further 
hihliographic search. This last item often saves as 
much time as is consumed in the routine search for 
a large number of titles. 

Where no file of Library of Congress printed 
cards is easily accessible there are other means of 
securing the serial number and avoiding delay and 
expense by its use. The monthly American Li- 
brary Association Booklist contains the card num- 
ber for each book described. The Cumulative 
Book Index published by the H. W. Wilson Com- 
pany of Minneapolis and the United States Catalog 
of Books in Print, January, 1912, give the card 
number in a very large . percent of entries. The 
various lists published by the Library of Congress, 
including the Catalogue of Copyright Entries, 
now give the card number in most cases. Among 
these lists the most commonly used is probably the 
Monthly List of State Publications, while the cur- 
rent bibliographic lists of recent years give the card 
number regularly. 

When the number has once been found it should 
be written on a standard size slip bearing the name 
of the library at the bottom . The number of copies 



PRINTED CATALOG CARDS 69 

of the card desired is indicated by drawing a dash 
or a slanting line after the card number followed by 
the number of copies. The author's name may be 
placed in the upper right hand corner, to identify 
the book in case the slip is returned, showing that 
cards are not at once available. 



Sample order slip 






Brown 


5-16381/4 




Homeville Public Library. 





In case the number is not known, the author, 
title, and imprint may be written on a similar card 
instead of the card number, the number of copies 
being indicated in the upper right hand corner. 



Sample order slip 


4 


Fox, John, 
Little Shepherd of Kingdom Come 
N. Y., Scribner's, 1903. 


Homeville Public Library. 



70 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

In each case it is important to indicate the num- 
ber of copies of the card desired. Librarians will 
find it profitable to order generously, as the expense 
of additional cards is so slight ($.008 each), in com- 
parison with the cost of ordering a second time, or 
of writing copies of the card when a sufficient num- 
ber has not been ordered. All slips should he ar- 
ranged in numerical or alphabetical order before being 
sent to the Library of Congress. 

Accounting. On beginning to use printed cards 
a deposit must be made with the Librarian of Con- 
gress through the Card Distribution Section. 
Cards ordered are charged against this deposit and 
statements are sent with each shipment of cards. 
From time to time the deposit must be renewed as 
it approaches exhaustion. Consult the Handbook 
of Card Distribution for details. 

Ordering cards when book is ordered. It is 
feasible to order the cards from Washington when 
the books are ordered from the dealer without wait- 
ing to have the volumes actually in hand. In case 
the card numbers can be found, the orders may be 
sent in the usual way. If facilities are wanting for 
ascertaining the card numbers, there are two 
methods open to the library purchasing cards. 
Slips like the one shown above, giving the author 
and title, etc. may be written for each item to be 
bought, or duplicates of the library's order-sheets 
to the dealer may be sent as orders for cards. On 



PRINTED CATALOG CARDS 71 

such sheets the orders should be arranged alpha- 
betically by authors, and sufficiently full descrip- 
tion of the books given to insure accuracy in filling 
the order. 

When cards so ordered arrive in the library they 
should be filed in a case in the catalog room to await 
the arrival of the books. It is a great convenience 
to place on the order sheets or slips some arbitrary 
symbol to indicate that Library of Congress cards 
have been ordered. If this symbol is written in 
pencil in a designated place in the book when the 
bill is checked up with the books, the catalogers will 
know at once without further search that cards 
are presumably waiting for it in the file. If the 
symbol is not found in the book in its regular place, 
a second search should be made for the number of 
the printed card, and if not found, either an author 
and title order should be sent to Washington, or 
the cards must be made in the library.^ 

If printed cards are not to be had, the returned 
card order slip bearing that statement may be 
filed in the place which the printed cards would 
have occupied in the file of cards awaiting books 
in the catalog room. If copies of the sheets sent 
to the dealer are used in ordering cards, the fact 
that the printed cards can not be obtained can also 

^ The Greek letter cp makes a convenient symbol for such 
purposes. It is written with one motion, means nothing to 
the uninitiated, and therefore need not be erased. 



72 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

be noted by means of an arbitrary symbol on the 
copy retained for comparison with the book dealer's 
invoice. The symbol may then be placed in the 
book, and the catalogers will know at once that 
cards must be written for that book in the library. 
The Card Section of the Library of Congress always 
returns the order, so that clerical labor is thereby 
saved to both parties. 

Ordering from ''traveling catalogs." Libraries 
which are recataloging their collections, or any large 
part of them, may arrange to have ''traveling cata- 
logs" of groups of books in the Library of Congress 
sent to them for the purpose of ordering cards for 
recataloging. This must naturally be a matter of 
special agreement. It has proven a highly useful 
device when any very large number of books is to 
be recataloged, and the library is not a depository 
for the set of printed cards. 

Scope of the Library of Congress stock of printed 
cards. The stock of printed cards of the Library 
of Congress now (1914) exceeds 650,000 titles. 
Over 50,000 titles are added annually. The stock 
includes (1) Practically all books copyrighted in 
the United States since July, 1898. (2) All classes 
of books in the library except Religion, Law, and 
some minor groups. In these classes, cards can be 
had for books copyrighted since July, 1898, and for 
most books purchased since June, 1901. These 
exceptions are steadily being diminished in number 



PRINTED CATALOG CARDS 73 

as the re-cataloging progresses. Further excep- 
tions are numerous ^'analyticals" and entries for 
parts of series, the cataloging of which has neces- 
sarily been deferred until the completion of the 
bulk of the main entries. 

In American History and in Bibliography the 
Library of Congress is especially rich. In other 
classes it is strong in works in English, but not so 
complete in foreign works. It possesses and has 
cataloged by far the largest collection of official 
publications of governments, national and local, in 
the United States. It has rich special collections, 
such as Music, Maps, and Prints, for large portions 
of which printed cards are available. The special- 
ized library, therefore, using printed cards from the 
Library of Congress will not find entries for all its 
books. A public library, particularly a small one, 
can usually obtain over ninety percent of its cards 
from Washington. The small college library can 
ordinarily secure cards for over sixty percent of its 
accessions. The great university libraries secure 
as yet only about half the cards needed for their 
accessions. 

Of late the Library of Congress has been printing 
for other libraries cards representing books not in 
its own collections. This practice has increased 
the stock by some eight thousand titles yearly. 
Cards are also printed for several of the larger 
government libraries in Washington, including 



74 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

those of the Department of Agriculture, the Bureau 
of Education, the Bureau of Fisheries and the 
Geological Survey. How far this feature may be 
developed remains to be seen, but the prospect for 
securing a printed card for practically every new 
book brightens daily. 

Printed cards from other libraries. A consider- 
able number of American and foreign libraries now 
print cards for all or part of their accessions, 
especially for books not covered by Library of 
Congress cards. The more important of these are 
The John Crerar Library of Chicago, the Libra- 
ries of Harvard and Chicago Universities, the 
Boston Public Library, the New York Public 
Library, the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, and 
the Royal Libraries of Berlin and The Hague. The 
Berlin Library now sells its cards to both regular 
subscribers and to occasional purchasers, and it is 
possible that arrangements could be made with 
some or all of the others to supply cards to libraries 
filling a special field. The day is not far distant 
when there will be some organization of this now 
scattered work, and printed cards may be bought 
for practically every book of importance. For the 
book of merely curious or trifling interest cards will 
still be made as of old in the library itself. Just 
how the work of combining orders, accounts, and 
shipments from several sources is to be organized 
remains of course for the future. The pressure of 



PRINTED CATALOG CARDS 75 

universal need and demand is bound to produce the 
result sought in time.^ 

Use in the library. When the book and the 
requisite number of printed cards for it have been 
brought together in the library, there remain the 
following processes : 

1. Comparison to see that the cards exactly 
correspond to the book in every particular. If 
they do not, and there has been no mistake in order- 
ing, changes may be made in the cards either by 
drawing a heavy line in ink through the words or 
figures to be changed, and then interpolating be- 
tween the lines or on the margin the proper data, or 
by erasing the words to be changed. The latter is 
a difficult and lengthy task, and never leaves the 
card in a neat and satisfactory appearance. 

2. Placing the classification number in the upper 
left-hand corner of all the cards, either with pen or 
typewriter. 

3. Writing the subject and other added entries 
on the top of the cards. If all the added entries 
indicated on the face of the card are not used, those 
actually employed should be checked on the card 
to go into the official catalog in order to render it 
possible to gather all the cards in case of subsequent 
removal, changes, or additions. 

4. In some libraries the accession number, or 

2 Cf . Library Journal, January and February, 1912. 



76 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

the order number, is placed on the back of each 
card. This device has certain decided advantages, 
particularly as a quick guide to accuracy in dis- 
tinguishing editions, copies, etc. 

5. If the heading (main entry) has not been com- 
pared with that already adopted in the library at the 
time of ordering the cards, this should be done at the 
outset in advance of the routine processes just out- 
lined. It happens not infrequently — particularly 
in the older libraries — that the adoption of the 
heading used by the Library of Congress may 
carry with it changes involving so many cards 
already in the catalog and requiring so much work 
as entirely to offset any advantage to be gained by 
the use of the printed cards. In such cases the 
decision not to follow the Library of Congress form 
of entry (which is in accordance with the Rules of 
the American Library Association) does not by 
any means involve the abandonment of the use of 
the printed cards. The space at the top of the 
card is sufficient to permit the heading already in 
use in the library to be written by pen or typewriter 
above the printed heading, which can be cancelled 
or enclosed in parentheses. 

6. The cards prepared for the library's use 
should be revised to guard against clerical errors, 
and placed in a box for filing, while the books are 
forwarded for labeling (or marking by any other 
process), or else sent directly to the shelves. 



PRINTED CATALOG CARDS 77 

Delay in receipt. Delay occasionally occurs in 
filling orders for various reasons set forth in the 
Handbook of Card Distribution, Part V. As a rule 
new books should not be held for cataloging until 
the arrival of the cards, but a temporary entry 
of the simplest form should be made and filed in 
the public catalog; of course when the printed cards 
arrive this temporary entry is removed and the 
printed card substituted. After some little ex- 
perience in the use of printed cards catalogers will 
find it easy to decide whether or not to hold a book 
pending the arrival of printed cards. 



Chapter VI 

CATALOGING METHOD 

RULES AND DECISIONS 

Codes.^ Probably most libraries in English 
speaking countries will wish to follow the Anglo- 
American code adopted by the British and Ameri- 

1 Cf . Cutter, Charles Ammi. Rules for a dictionary 
catalog. 4th ed., rewritten. Washington, Govt. Print. 
Off., 1904. 173 p. (U.S. Bureau of Education). 

Dewey, Melvil. Library school rules: I. Card catalog 
rules; 2. Accession book rules; 3. Shelf list rules. 4th ed. 
Boston, Library Bureau, 1899. 

Dewey, Melvil. Simplified Library school rules; card 
catalog, accession, book numbers, shelf list, capitals, punc- 
tuation, abbreviations, library handwriting. Boston, 
Library Bureau, 1898. 

Fumagalli, Giuseppe. Cataloghi di biblioteche, e indice 
bibliographici; memoria. Firenze, G. C. Sansoni, 1887. 

Linderfelt, Klas August. Eclectic card catalog rules; 
author and title entries, based on Dziatzko's ''Instruction" 
compared with the rules of the British Museum, Cutter, 
Dewey, Perkins, and other authorities, with an appendix, 
containing a list of oriental titles of honor and occupa- 
tions. Boston, C. A. Cutter, 1890. 

New South Wales. Public library, Sydney. Guide to 
the system of cataloguing of the reference library; with 
rules for cataloguing, the Relative decimal classification, 
and headings used in the subject-index. By H. C. L. Ander- 

78 



CATALOGING METHOD 79 

can Library Associations. ^ This code is in the 
main the guide to practice of most American libra- 
ries at the present day, and is followed by the Li- 
brary of Congress in its printed cards in all save a 
few minor particulars. As is well known, it differs 
from the practice of the principal European codes 
chiefly in its treatment of what are known as 
*' corporate entries," i.e., the whole body of publi- 

son. 4th ed. March, 1902. Sydney, W. A. GuUick, gov- 
ernment printer, 1902. 

Perkins, Frederic Beecher. San Francisco cataloguing 
for public libraries. A manual based on the system in use 
in the San Francisco free public library. San Francisco, 
C. A. Murdock & Co., 1884. 

Instructionen fiir die alphabetischen katalog der preus- 
zischenbibliotheken. Zweiteausg., 1908. Berlin, Behrend 
& Cie., 1909. 

Quinn, John Henry. Manual of library cataloguing. 
London, Library Supply Co., 1899; rev. ed., 1913. 

Spain. Junta facultativa de archivos, bibliotecas, y 
museos. Instrucciones para la redaccion de los catdlogos 
en las bibliotecas publicas del estado. Madrid, Tip. de la 
Revista de archivos, bibliotecas y museos, 1902. 

Vienna. K. K. HofbibUothek. Vorschrift fur die ver- 
fassung des alphabetischen nominal-zettelkatalogs der 
druckwerke. Hrsg. von der Direction. Mit zwei beilagen, 
einem sachregister und 500 beispielen. Wien, Selbstverlag 
der K. K. HofbibUothek, 1901. 

2 Catalog rules: author and title entries. Compiled by 
committees of the American Library Association and the 
(British) Library Association. American ed. Boston, A. 
L. A. Publishing Board, 1908. 



80 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

cations of governments,^ institutions, societies, etc. 
There are surprisingly few points of difference be- 
tween American and British practice under this 
code. Perhaps in time some agreement may yet 
be reached with Continental libraries which will 
admit of freer interchange of catalog cards and 
bibliographic data. 

No code can be a complete guide to practice. 
Commentaries spring up almost immediately upon 
the adoption of a set of rules. The Library of Con- 
gress has issued (in card form) a supplemental set 
of rules, giving its own practice in matters not 
covered in the American Library Association code 
or requiring additional directions. Probably few 
libraries will need to follow all of these supplemental 
rules, many of which are rendered necessary by the 
great number of books in the collections of the 
Library of Congress. 

Guides. The Library Association code is com- 
paratively short and simple. Moreover it consists 
at present (1914) of rules for author entry only, 
with but little discussion of the principles laid down. 
It is generally found useful, therefore, to supple- 
ment this code by Cutter's Rules for a Dictionary 
Catalog (4th ed., Washington, Govt. Printing 
Office, 1904). Many libraries which have in the 
past used the Rules of the New York State Library 
School (Boston, Library Bureau, 1899), will find 
these still of decided help, particularly in interpret- 



CATALOGING METHOD 81 

ing earlier practice. Other aids may be freely used, 
provided that the fundamental distinction between 
the earlier codes and modern practice, i.e., the use 
of one card for all purposes, is not lost sight of .^ 

Decisions. No matter how carefully and loyally 
the effort is made to follow a set of rules, there will 
constantly arise cases in which the proper practice 
is doubtful and requires study. Whenever general 
principles rather than particular and isolated cases 
are involved, a decision must be made between 
the various possible entries or forms of entry. Such 
decisions may well be rendered by the librarian in 
counsel with not only the chief cataloger but with 
various other chiefs of departments. The cata- 
loger's work touches everyone in the library. An 
attitude of aloofness toward it on the part of any 
portion of the staff is always unfortunate, and may 
be lamentably serious. Decisions on particular 
entries or minor points need not, of course, be the 
subject of general discussions. But interpretations 
of the rules which determine habitual treatment of 
debatable classes of entries must necessarily be 
known to all the staff, and the various branches of 
the service should be heard on them. 

Decisions once reached should be recorded and 

3 Brown, J. D. Library Classification and Cataloguing. 
London, Libraco Ltd., 1912. 

Quinn, T. H. Manual of library cataloguing. London, 
Truslove and Hanson, 1913. 



82 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

duplicated. If a board sits on points of cataloging 
practice, as in some large libraries, one of its mem- 
bers should serve as secretary and keep a journal 
of topics discussed and results reached. These 
results — drawn as compactly as possible — should 
be communicated to every member of the library 
staff who will use either the catalog or any other 
records of the library. Only in this manner can 
uniformity of information or action be secured. 
The accessions clerk, the binding clerk, the period- 
ical clerk (in large libraries), will then use the same 
style of entry as those found in the catalog, to the 
vast improvement of the service.^ 

Aside from this record of decisions in debatable 
cases there will still be need for record in the ofE.<?ial 
catalog of the final decision in every individual case. 
A card bearing the heading adopted, the authori- 
ties consulted, the opposing possibilities, and per- 
haps a very brief statement of the reason for the 
adoption of the chosen entry, and (most important 
of all) the date and initials of the person rendering 
the decision, should be inserted before each head- 
ing which has been questioned. 

* In tracing in one Hbrary a missing part of a German 
work appearing at irregular intervals and in varying edi- 
tions — Iwan Mueller's Handbuch, to wit, I have found as. 
many as five different forms of entry for the various parts in 
different records. Naturally there was much time wasted 
in identifying these different entries — and perhaps the miss- 
ing part had been entered a sixth way, and was after all in 
the Library. 



CATALOGING METHOD 83 

Old entries and new rules. In any library which 
antedates the formulation of the American Library 
Association code there may of course be thousands 
of entries made in conformity with earlier rules 
which contravene the new rules. It becomes a 
very serious matter to bring the old and the new 
into line, especially when printed cards are to be 
used for current accessions. In such cases it is 
frequently possible to buy printed cards (occasion- 
ally with some slight variation of imprint) for all 
the older entries of a given author, thus making 
thorough work of the revision at a minimum of 
expense, and insuring reasonable continuity for the 
future. In many cases this drastic and effective 
method is not feasible. Then it is always possible 
to use the printed card, cancelling the heading, and 
writing above it that previously used in the library. 
There is sufficient space at the top of the cards to 
permit this practice. In this way very extensive 
changes may be avoided, and later when printed 
cards become available for all the old book's (as 
they surely will from some source), the change can 
be made en hloc. Awaiting that happy event, it 
is well to insert in the file of Library of Congress 
cards (or cut proof sheets), supposing such a file to 
be kept as a necessary part of the cataloging equip- 
ment, a dated note of the decision just before the 
entry v/hich it has been decided not to f ollow\ This 
will secure uniformity of treatment, and further 



84 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

when a very large number of printed cards becomes 
available, the filers will from time to time report 
that fact to the head of the cataloging work, who 
can then take up the question of substituting the 
new entry for the old in systematic fashion. 

Decisions on subject headings. While the mat- 
ter of subject headings will be discussed in a later 
chapter, it may be well to point out here the need 
for an official list in the catalog room of all subject 
headings adopted, containing, of course, full refer- 
ences from the various forms proposed but not 
chosen. When libraries are small, the need for 
such a list is not felt, and it is too frequently 
ignored. The more specific the purpose of the 
library, the more its list of subject headings will 
vary from those ordinarily employed in libraries, 
and the greater the need for proper record. But it 
is exactly in such specializing libraries that pre- 
cautions of this nature are generally not taken until 
confusion and laxness have driven home the neces- 
sity for system. The library of a laboratory or of 
a professional institution can not, of course, be 
content with smy such list of subject headings as 
the American Library Association List, though it 
may well follow this list or the Library of Congress 
List for its general headings. But if no official list 
is kept, continuity of treatment becomes a matter 
of mood and memory, and a change of catalogers 
brings disaster. The simple device of a card list of 



CATALOGING METHOD 85 

all subject entries prevents most difficulties from 
arising, and helps greatly to resolve such as must be 
met. Here also each card should bear date and 
initials, and on the back should be recorded any 
references to it inserted elsewhere in the list. If 
the subject is an unusual or peculiar one, a brief 
note of the book or books for which it was used is 
not difficult to add at the time of its adoption, and 
aids greatly in subsequent interpretation of the 
entry. In general it may be said that lists of this 
sort suffer from too laconic entries rather than from 
an excess of information. Definition of the mean- 
ing and scope of the subject heading should- be re- 
corded in all cases in which any doubt can arise. 

One whole class of entries can be eliminated from 
such a list of subjects by adopting the rule that the 
form of subject entry for a person shall invariably 
be the same as the author entry for that person. 
Thus the rules for authors govern all biographical 
and other individual subject headings. The use 
of a scheme of subheads for subject entries for indi- 
viduals identical (or nearly so) with the correspond- 
ing subheads of the classification will avoid the 
necessity for further record in the subject list. 
Thus the subject list will contain few names of 
persons, though the subject catalog may contain 
thousands. 

Libraries with catalogs begun years since and 
which have never recorded a list of their subject 



86 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

entries in their catalog rooms will find the labor of 
drawing off onto cards such a list amply repaid. 
Discrepancies and errors never suspected will 
speedily be brought to light to the great benefit of 
the catalog. Moreover the saving of time thereby 
effected in the cataloging of new accessions is much 
greater than would at first be supposed. With such 
a list at hand there is no need to search through the 
catalog for various possible subject entries. The 
time thus saved is perhaps even greater than in the 
case of the ''official " author catalog, — and the value 
of that tool is well known. The gain to readers 
through uniformity in the treatment of subjects 
is so great that any device which assists in securing 
uniformity is rendered worth while, unless it be 
too clumsy or too expensive to operate. 

Unit card. It is inevitable that the use of several 
copies of one printed card should strengthen the 
practically identical method of duplicating a single 
card for books for which a printed card can not be 
secured, that is, the adoption of what has been 
termed the ''unit card " system for all books. Other 
advantages than those of routine are found in this 
practice, the chief of which is perhaps the saving 
thus effected in the time of the more highly paid 
assistants, who write but the first card, indicating 
all added entries, etc. This card is then copied 
and the various added entries made by the copyist 
on the cards requiring them. The fact that the 



CATALOGING METHOD 87 

reader using the catalog thus has the same informa- 
tion before him whichever form of entry he consults 
is also a decided gain. The unit card duplicated 
in accordance with need is therefore the basic 
principle of modern library practice. 

ROUTINE 

Having decided on a code of rules, the number 
and kind of catalogs to be maintained, the use of 
printed cards where possible, and the principle of 
one card duplicated for various purposes, the rou- 
tine of cataloging practice next comes up for study. 
This routine must vary with each institution and 
each group of individuals. But whether the library 
be large or small, whether its catalogers are special- 
ists or not, there remain certain main processes 
which will have to be performed and certain points 
which will require decision. These are taken up 
in the order in which they are customarily per- 
formed. 

Assignment of work.^ Too frequently the person 
in charge of cataloging work — whether he be the 
librarian in a small library, or the head cataloger 
in a large one — forgets that there is great need for 
discretion in planning the work. Too often it hap- 
pens that new books are handled in steady sequence, 
without discrimination either as to their relative 

5Cf.p.52. 



88 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

importance and the character of the work involved 
in cataloging them, or the differing abilities of the 
cataloging force. In directing a group of cata- 
logers the total output and the efficiency of the 
staff can be greatly multiplied by continual and 
careful study of the work as it presents itself day 
by day. Too many problems requiring vexatious 
study and investigation should not go to the sort 
of cataloger who does routine clerical work by the 
hour without fatigue — nor should too heavy doses 
of simple cataloging be continued when it is evident 
that the recipient is ''going stale." Of course 
certain catagories will present themselves : Russian 
books must be done by the one who knows Russian, 
for example. The head cataloger who will take 
pains to find out what each of his people can do best, 
what each likes to do most, and what each does 
poorly, will be able to assign tasks so deftly that 
the force will work rapidly and harmoniously, will 
develope an esprit-de-corps, and will handle an 
astonishing number of books. He will, of course, 
encourage specialization, but will not suffer the 
specialist to neglect his general knowledge of cata- 
loging and of the library in which he is working. 

Main entry. In some libraries entry is de- 
termined as a matter of routine by each cataloger 
for the book he has in hand. In others entry is 
determined first, generally by a cataloger of higher 
rank or greater experience, and the description of 



CATALOGING METHOD 89 

the book prepared by another from the marked 
titlepage. There are advantages in either method. 
Supposing a file of Library of Congress printed 
cards (or cut proofsheets) to be kept in the library, 
there is a decided gain in having one person of ex- 
perience search for entry and for printed cards as 
well, thus making one process with two ends in 
view. Whether an entry is found in the Library 
of Congress file or not, search should again be made 
in the library's official catalog for the form of entry 
previously adopted in the library. If this is found 
to differ from the Library of Congress form (and 
if the difference is not one of rule, and therefore 
well recognized by all the force) the discrepancy 
should be reported to the chief cataloger and a de- 
cision reached as to which form to follow. This 
decision may well be a matter of conference with 
the librarian if there are numerous entries, for there 
will be a certain amount of expense involved in 
extensive changes, to say nothing of inconvenience. 
The proper form of entry, it may be remarked, is 
very easily found for at least three quarters of the 
books cataloged. 

If no entry is found in the Library of Congress 
file or in the the official catalog, it is questionable 
whether the person making the search should go 
further. Unless the entry is obviously a matter 
which will prove very puzzling, the book had better 
be forwarded at once to its cataloger. Serious 



90 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

problems should be kept for consultation with the 
chief of the cataloging work.® 

Title. The present American Library Associa- 
tion rule is to transcribe the whole title, neither 
altering or abridging it in any way. In perhaps 
ninety per cent of modern books this rule is per- 
fectly sensible and praiseworthy. There is no 
chance for error in thus copying the titlepage, and 
questions as to editions, etc., can hardly arise, if 
this is done. But in the case of a few modern books 
and in most books prior to the nineteenth century 
the slavish following of this rule works confusion 
and trouble. It is frequently necessary to carry 
the title (even on the printed cards) over to a second 
card, and occasionally even to a third and fourth 
card. Generally the smaller and less important 
the book, the longer the title. The rule is absurd 
when it gives us two or more cards where one would 
be enough for every practical purpose. There 
should be some latitude allowed catalogers in this 
matter, and heads of libraries will do well to insist 
that the rule be not followed in its letter. 

^ No attempt is made in this work to discuss the theory 
of entry, nor to offer suggestions on disputed points. The 
various codes previously cited and the works on cataloging 
mentioned in the footnotes, will prove ample for those who 
desire to compare authorities or to investigate problems. 
Here we are concerned solely with the practice of catalog- 
ing, taking up matters which have to be decided and carried 
out in the course of each day's work. 



CATALOGING METHOD 91 

It is ordinarily better to begin even an abridged 
title with the first words on the page, and let the 
eliminations come in the latter part. Of course 
this is not always possible, particularly in catalog- 
ing German programmen and the like, in which 
the vital portion of the title is frequently given in 
small type at the bottom of the page — perhaps even 
on the back of the titlepage, preceded by Inest or 
Insunt. In such cases the lengthy and formal head- 
ing subsides on the catalog card into a very much 
abbreviated note. 

Author 's name in title. Following out the theory 
that the title is to be an accurate and complete tran- 
script of the titlepage, the American Library Associ- 
ation Rules command that the author's name shall 
be given just as it appears on the titlepage, gen- 
erally as a part of a sentence, as, '' Library classi- 
fication and cataloging, by James Duff Brown, "or; 
''The subject-catalogs of the Library of Congress 
By J. C. M. Hanson," notwithstanding the fact 
that the author's name has already appeared in the 
heading. This practice has a certain value, par- 
ticularly in the numerous cases in which the author 's 
name as given on the titlepage is different from the 
heading adopted as the main entry. Any doubt as 
to what was the form actuall^^ used on the titlepage 
disappears when this rule is followed. In probably 
ninety out of a hundred of the books cataloged the 
rule involves unnecessary labor and repetition of 



92 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

that labor in duplicating cards by hand. Conse- 
quently it seems a wholly unnecessary practice to 
adopt in the case of cards made in the library. 
Small and moderately large libraries will do well to 
observe the rule in every case in which the heading 
used differs from the name given on the titlepage. 
In all other cases the phrase containing the author 's 
name may safely be omitted. 

Edition. The modern practice is to treat the 
note of the edition as a part of the title, and to insert 
it before the imprint without regard to its actual 
place on the titlepage. If ascertained elsewhere, 
the facts are given in square brackets. Even small 
libraries can not safely omit the statement of the 
edition, however simple their catalogs. 

Exactly what constitutes an ''edition" is not 
easy to say. It is not well to go behind the face 
of the titlepage in this matter. A note is the proper 
place for any comment on the claim in the title. 
Doubt arises chiefly in the case of first editions and 
"issues, " and is generally a matter of bibliographic 
minutiae rather than of essential differences in 
the text of the work. 

Imprint. Place, publisher, and date constitute 
the imprint as ordinarily defined in cataloging prac- 
tice. No one of these items can be omitted with 
safety on any card. The record of them does far 
more than differentiate between editions of a book. 
In nine cases out of ten when a book other than 



CATALOGING METHOD 93 

fiction is looked up in a card catalog, the place and 
date determine the reader's selection of a book by 
an author previously unknown to him. In about 
the same per cent of cases the publisher's general 
reputation influences the reader's choice. Of 
course it makes little difference to the average 
reader whether an edition of, for instance. The 
Pilgrim's Progress was published in London, or 
Dublin, or New York by any one of a score of firms. 
But even in such a case the man with a little knowl- 
edge of books will ask for an edition by a certain 
firm because he knows the style of book, of type, 
etc., commonly used by that firm at a given time. 
He will prefer to read an edition printed by Ticknor 
and Fields to one issued, let us say, by the Ameri- 
can Tract Society. 

But much more important is the significance of 
the date and place of publication as indicating the 
probable character of the book, the state of knowl- 
edge at the time of publication. On the referen- 
dum, for example, a book printed in the seventies 
would be of little use to a student of present Ameri- 
can tendencies. These things are the veriest com- 
monplace of scholarly investigation, but unfortu- 
nately in their zeal to save time and money, too 
many librarians have allowed themselves to take 
the point of view of the persistent reader of fiction 
in the manufacture of their catalog cards. To the 
devourer of novels in the average circulating 



94 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

library, place, publisher, and date are alike mean- 
ingless and unnoticed. But not so to the rest of 
the world. 

Collation. The extent to which collation shall 
be given must be determined by each library for 
itself. On the Library of Congress printed cards 
will be found a fairly full collation, including such 
items as preliminary leaves, illustrations, tables, 
diagrams, maps, plans, facsimilies, plates, series- 
notes, etc, in addition to the ordinary information of 
the number of pages (or volumes) and the height 
of the book. Now this information is sometimes 
very valuable, and is never obtrusive, being in 
smaller type and on a separate line from the title 
and imprint. But it is very doubtful whether it 
is wise for every library to attempt the same full- 
ness in the case of every card it makes for itself. 
There is no question that even small libraries will 
need to give the number of volumes or pages, the 
height (or size) of the book, and on occasion the 
series note. Maps and illustrations may well be 
noted, as the fact that one book has them and 
another on the same topic does not will frequently 
influence the reader's choice. But that all geome- 
tries, for example, should have the fact that they 
contain diagrams specified on the card remains to 
be proven. It would seem sensible in the case of 
most libraries to note in the collation only such 
items as are likely to be of service in selecting or 



CATALOGING METHOD 95 

identifying the book. Very large libraries will 
doubtless desire full collation. And in small or 
specialized libraries books of peculiar rarity or 
interest may be treated with especial fullness. 
The main thing is to have a definite rule as regards 
the collation of the average book — not to leave the 
matter to the whim of the cataloger or to chance. 

Notes. The chief difficulty in the matter of 
notes in the case of typewritten or handwritten 
cards is that, being of the same size of type or letter 
as the title, they occupy an inordinate amount of 
room, are not easily distinguished from the title 
and consequently lead the inexpert users of the 
catalog into some confusion. The use of type of a 
smaller size enables the note to drop into its proper 
position as a note on the printed card. The average 
library, then, in its own unprinted catalog cards 
will probably be chary of notes for the average 
book. But precisely because they are not needed 
for the ordinary, straight-forward work produced 
by one person, on a definite topic, and published 
at a given time and place by an established com- 
mercial publisher, they are needed in the case of 
the vast number of brochures and volumes brought 
out by various individuals or organizations in 
cooperation, and printed by some society, govern- 
ment, magazine, or institution. We live in an age 
of journalism and of society publications. For 
such the descriptive note is the reader's salvation. 



96 MODERN LIBRA.RY CATALOGING 

Notes should be notes, not explanations or trea- 
tises. Conciseness and brevity must be insisted 
on. Particular care is needed not to omit informa- 
tion which will enable a second copy existing in 
some series, or set, to be located rapidly. The 
caution that the note should be distinguished from 
the customary bibliographic description of the 
book by both dropping a line on the card, and mak- 
ing it a new paragraph is perhaps not superfluous. 

The preceding paragraphs refer of course to notes 
of a strictly bibliographic character, telling how 
and in what form the book described was published, 
whether it is an original or a later issue, etc. Other 
kinds of notes are also in vogue among catalogers. 
Among them are the ''contents'' note, and an 
''evaluation" of the book itself, as distinguished 
from the form of its publication. 

Contents. The practice of giving the contents 
in a note in the case of books either of composite 
authorship or on a variety of topics (as a book of 
essays or a collection of short stories) is growing 
steadily in favor. Contents are also frequently 
listed when the title of the book is misleading or 
inaccurate, or does not indicate definitely the scope 
of the work. Occasionally the full contents are not 
given, but only the headings of parts or volumes. 
These indications of the scope of a book are always 
welcome to students, and serve a most useful pur- 
pose. They save a great amount of time and no 
little vexation. 



CATALOGING METHOD 97 

The question of giving the contents on catalog 
cards made in the library should usually be decided 
by the head cataloger in accordance with a policy 
adopted by the library. When the entry is de- 
termined it is frequently possible to suggest — or 
direct — that a contents note be made. Even small 
libraries will find that such notes repay the time 
spent on them, supposing always that the decision 
that a note is required be made with discrimination. 
The rule should be to give contents only w^hen such 
a note will aid in interpreting a title which lacks 
definiteness. In other cases even large libraries 
will omit it because it is not needed. Contents 
notes are generally sufficient to indicate the scope 
of a book — if not, a further note may be desirable. 

Evaluation.^ How far a library should go in giv- 
ing an appraisal of the value or character of its 
books is a debated question. No one will dispute 
the worth of critical lists of books prepared by com- 
petent authorities for particular classes of readers. 
But to undertake to give even a slight critical note 
for every book added to the library involves so 
much work in the creation of a product of doubtful, 

■^ Cf . Savage, E. A. Manual of descriptive annotation 
for library catalogues. London, Library Supply Co., 1906. 

For the literature on this topic down to 1909 cf . Cannons, 
Bibliography of Library Economy, p. 357-358. 

Cf. also lies, George. A bureau of review. An address 
to the New York State Library School, Albany, April 18, 
1913. 



98 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

or at least ephemeral, value that many, if not most, 
librarians shrink from adopting the plan. Libra- 
ries are of such diverse sorts, and have such widely 
differing constituencies that no writer can attempt 
to lay down a rule in this matter. The need of the 
reader is, however, the sole guiding principle in 
this, as in other problems. Where the readers are 
all specialists, as in a seminar library or that of a 
great manufacturing establishment, there is no 
need for the ordinary note, but on the contrary a 
pointed and brief estimate of the worth of the book 
from the standpoint of the workers in that par- 
ticular field may prove a most valuable addition 
to the catalog, increasing greatly its usefulness as 
a tool of research. Where the readers are mostly 
inexpert, the need for description and appraisal is 
perhaps more keenly felt, but is vastly more diffi- 
cult to give. The plight of the untrained man or 
woman standing before a huge card catalog is truly 
a challenge to the inventiveness of the makers of 
that instrument. To leave these readers wholly 
without guidance seems in the light of modern 
library aims both improvident and unfair. And 
yet the difficulties in the way of the average library, 
hard pressed for funds, and conscious of its own 
inadequacy in many directions, are so apparent 
that few librarians have felt justified in adopting 
the principle of evaluation for all books. -^ 

After all, the problem is one of arrangement and 



CATALOGING METHOD 99 

style of catalog, as well as of descriptive or critical 
notes. If notes are to be of any value, they must 
be found quickly and seen easily. The catalog 
in book form or the bulletin, or else the special list, 
affords opportunity for descriptive or critical anno- 
tation which the ordinary catalog of typewritten 
or manuscript cards does not and can not furnish. 
If the library goes in for evaluation, it will almost 
be forced to abandon the alphabetical arrangement 
under subjects. If it presumes to say that a certain 
book is by far the best one ever written on a topic, 
it is of course wholly foolish to leave that fact to 
be discovered in the proper alphabetical place in 
which its author falls . Logic would seem to require 
an arrangement of a different sort. 

When it is desired to give notes on cards, it will 
probably be best to confine them to such points as 
the author's qualifications, his attitude ''pro" or 
''con" on a debated topic, the scope of the treat- 
ment, and perhaps some indication of the manner 
of handling his theme. These can usually be given 
succinctly, frequently in a single phrase or word. 
It is highly desirable that all the information be 
on one card. Lengthy notes are a source of con- 
fusion. 

Series cards. This is a day of publishers' series 
and sets. Moreover, books that of themselves 
would never find a publisher are brought out by 
various forms of cooperation. Institutions of all 



100 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

sorts, and innumerable societies issue series of 
monographs. Frequently the name of the col- 
lected group is better known than that of any of its 
members. Still more frequently books are cited 
by the number (or year), in the collected title, or 
even by some such loose description as ''Renan's 
Hibbert Lectures." All too seldom are these 
series numbered consecutively and normally. 
Usually there are additional volumes, interpola- 
tions, sub-series, omissions, and other interruptions 
to the smooth current of volumes flowing from the 
press. Hence vexation and loss of time. Series 
cards should therefore be made for every sort of 
series, and preferably a separate card should be 
written for each monograph, rather than a number 
of entries on a single card. This enables one to 
interpolate printed cards very freely (with the 
* series entry written on top), and also to fill in gaps 
in the series cards as the missing volumes are pro- 
cured. Of course a note must be made on the back 
of the main entry card in the official catalog indi- 
cating that a series entry is made. (When the 
series is the main entry, note must be made of ana- 
lytical cards for monographs.) This work is always 
vexatious and difficult to keep absolutely up to date, 
but it pays as few departments of cataloging pay. 
The comfort of full series cards can only be felt by 
reference librarians who have worked without 
them. 



CATALOGING METHOD 101 

Analyticals. The analysis of books of composite 
authorship or treating of a variety of topics is a 
problem demanding the continual exercise of dis- 
cretion. Whether to make ''analyticals" or to let 
the main entry stand for the work without further 
note must be determined by each librarian with the 
needs of his own constituency in view. A special 
library may need to make analytical entries that 
amount to indexing the chapters of a book. A 
public library may be obliged to let a single entry 
suffice for even a publisher's series. In general the 
opinion of reference librarians is for as many analyt- 
icals as can be manufactured considering the whole 
burden of cataloging work. It should be borne 
in mind that the analysis of composite works and 
series is very likely to be the subject of cooperative 
effort in the future, and librarians may well hesitate 
to enter on formidable tasks of the sort when in a 
few years, or even months, printed cards may be 
bought at a cheap price. For instance what library 
would lightly undertake to make cards for every 
title in the great set of the Greek and Latin Fathers 
published by Migne, the Patrologiae ciirsus com- 
putus, without counting the cost very carefully, 
remembering that every item is entered in the cata- 
logs of the Peabody Institute and of the British 
Museum? A further cause for hesitation is the 
fact that each analytical requires subject cards, 
and frequently other added entries as well. 



102 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

Opposed to this cautious view is the crying need 
for the identification of every work of a given author 
or on a given topic. It is of decided value to know 
that the library has the collections of some society, 
the memoirs of some academy, the lectures on some 
foundation. But for once that such a book as 
Hatch's Influence of Greek Ideas and Usages upon 
the Christian Church is cited as the Hibbert Lec- 
tures for 1888, or Max West's Inheritance Tax as 
volume 4, part 2 of the Columbia University Studies 
in history, economics and public law, they are re- 
ferred to ten times by their authors' names or their 
titles as monographs. But not monographs in 
series alone demand analyticals; commemorative 
Yoluiaes, festschrif ten and various other composite 
books appear in ever increasing numbers, and re- 
quire analysis, if their contents are to be of any 
value. And despite the multiplication of profes- 
sional bibliographies and indexes, it is by no means 
certain that the modern library can afford to ignore 
in its public catalog the articles in the more im- 
portant periodicals. The temptation to make 
analytical entries is therefore very strong. 

When a decision has been made to enter on the 
analysis of a series or even a single work, if ten or 
more cards in all are to be needed, and if the library 
owns a small job printing press (or flexotype), it is 
a very economical method to print the title of the 
book or series on blank cards, allowing sufficient 



CATALOGING METHOD 103 

space for the entry and individual title above the 
printed lines. The call number can usually also 
be printed, and occasionally the place and date, 
leaving only a small amount to be filled in by hand 
for each varying title. 

Added entries. All cards made for a book in 
addition to the main entry card are technically 
termed "added entries," or additional entries. 
These are ordinarily cards indicating the subject 
or title of a book, or cards giving additional informa- 
tion as to the persons concerned in its production, 
such as translators, joint-authors, editors, etc. 
Subject entry is treated in the following chapter. 
It is necessary to adopt a definite policy as to added 
entries, to determine how freely they shall be made, 
and what form the cards for them shall take. In 
using printed cards, added entries are written above 
the main heading, usually indenting one space. If 
the "unit" card system is followed, the same prac- 
tice will be pursued for cards written in the library. 
It is well to make added entries freely, particularly 
for titles, editors and translators. Added entry 
cards should in every case bear the call number of 
the book, and should be recorded on the main entry 
card. Some libraries restrict added entries on the 
ground that they require extra labor, but they are 
of so much value in the practical use of the catalog 
that the work is well spent. 

Title cards. An entry should be made for every 



104 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

distinctive or significant title, including the titles 
of all novels, books of essays, and separately pub- 
lished poems. Titles beginning with such words as 
"On, "^'Report," ''History," ''Account,'' ''Narra- 
tive," and the like will not ordinarily require a 
title entry. But the very general habit on the part 
of readers of recalling titles rather than authors 
makes the free use of title entries highly advisable. 
In the case of the unit card, the method is clear and 
simple, as with the printed card. Some libraries 
will prefer still to follow the old custom of making 
merely a title reference card in the interest of sup- 
posed economy. This practice is not a bad one 
in small libraries, if only the call number is given. 
In general it is bad policy to send a reader from one 
card to another to get information, particularly the 
call number of the book. Only general reference 
cards which naturally apply to all the works by 
one author or on a given topic may with safety omit 
the call number, and even these may give it in many 
cases, as when the author has a definite place in 
the classification of literature. 

Reference cards. Cards for variant forms of 
name should be freely made, and recorded in 
the ofiicial catalog on the card noting the final 
decision, with the authorities followed, date, etc. 
Corresponding to these are the ''See" and "See 
also" references in the subject cards. As refer- 
ence cards need be made but once, pains should 



CATALOGING METHOD 105 

be taken to see that they are made at the time a 
decision on a debatable entry is reached. If this 
is always done, no reference cards need ordinarily 
be written whenever an entry is found in the official 
catalog. The fact that the various forms are noted 
and checked on the decision card is of itself suffi- 
cient, unless some new and unrecorded form occurs 
on the title page of the book to be cataloged. 

COPYING 

The chief cost, all things considered, in copying 
is the necessary revision of the work. The eye and 
hand fatigue which copying involves, and the time 
and strength needed for its accurate revision point 
to some mechanical means of copying the ^'unit'^ 
card made by the cataloger as a practical necessity. 
This has been sought in various mechanical devices. 

Hectograph, etc. The "hectograph," ''shapiro- 
graph," ''copygraph, " and various other processes 
depending on the use of an aniline dye ink and a 
gelatine or putty pad are the chief of these. The 
results obtained are surprisingly good, although the 
ink will surely fade in time, and that more quickly 
than the ink in a thoroughly good typewriter record 
ribbon. But as catalog cards in trays are but little 
exposed to sunlight, the fading is not rapid, and 
the cards in any public catalog will probably need 
to be replaced because they are soiled long before 
the ink has faded. That replacement can probably 



106 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

be done with printed cards when the time comes to 
do it . One serious difficulty in the use of this means 
of duplication by facsimile is the necessity for an 
initial card free from corrections and entirely clear 
and legible. The original of the hectograph dupli- 
cation must of course be made slowly and very 
carefully, and must be revised before the copies are 
taken. 

Flexotype, etc. Certain processes involving the 
use of movable types and quick printing have 
proven very successful on a small scale. ^ There is 
a decided advantage in that one proofreading serves 
for all the copies to be made. It is even possible 
for a bright boy who has received a little instruction 
to make the cards from the titlepage previously 
marked by the cataloger, thus saving a great deal 
of labor. The result is a card resembling a type- 
written one, but clearer in outline, and very cheaply 
made. Five, ten, or more copies can be made with 
great rapidity after the first revision, and no further 
revision is needed, except for added entries, etc., as 
in the case of the printed cards. The machines are 
somewhat expensive, but should be very profitable 
in libraries where much cheap work must be done, 
frequently in haste and with an absence of refine- 
ment in details. It is possible that the future will 

8 Cf . Raney, M. L. The multigraph and the flexotype 
in cataloging work. Library Journal, December, 1911, v. 
36, p. 629-32. 



CATALOGING METHOD 107 

see extensive improvements and the wide adoption 
of such means of duplication. 

Typewriter. The cards can be copied on a type- 
writer, but of course each one must then be revised 
separately. Care should be given to securing 
proper card holders, platens, and record ribbons. 
The ribbons containing the so-called '' copying '^ 
inks must never be used on card work, as this ink 
both fades quickly and smears badly. Ribbons 
made by any of the prominent manufacturers which 
are guaranteed by the makers to be for ''record" 
purposes contain a large percentage of carbon, and 
have given satisfactory results under the most ex- 
acting tests. 

Hand copying. If cards are copied by hand, or 
all made by the cataloger, two precautions must be 
observed. First, the ink must be a true record 
ink, such as conforms to the tests for durability 
instituted by the Massachusetts Commissioner of 
Records.^ Second, the copying must be entirely 
legible. A ''library" hand is not an absolute nec- 
essity, but it is generally a decided advantage to 
acquire it. Many librarians prefer the "dis- 
jointed" hand or print form to the ordinary vertical 
cursive handwriting taught in the schools. 

It is probable that the future will see some me- 
chanical copier, or even some machine for photo- 

9 Cf . Massachusetts. Record Commission. Report on 
record inks and paper, Boston, 1891, and subsequent re- 
ports. 



108 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

graphic reproduction of cards which will displace 
hand copying entirely. 

FILING 

When the cards are all made and revised they 
must be filed in the various catalogs. This is a 
much more serious task than is commonly supposed, 
and grows more difficult with the rapid increase in 
size of our card catalogs. Absolute accuracy in 
filing is a sine qua non in the card catalog. This 
means not only the consistent following of rules of 
arrangement, but no carelessness and no mistakes. 
As a matter of physiological psychology we know 
that very few persons are capable of continuous 
filing for several hours without undue fatigue which 
surely results in inaccuracy. 

Filers should then be chosen with great care and 
by thorough tests. A physique which will enable 
one to stand at the cases (or to get up and down 
very often, if the filing is done sitting) , for some 
hours daily, eyes which are not easily strained by 
sustained attention to details of cards in order to 
preserve a strictly alphabetic arrangement, and an 
accurate habit of mind must be sought for and 
found, if the filing is to be done well. If it is done 
ill, the whole cataloging force will fall into disrepute. 
Some people are born filers. They can keep at it 
day in and day out without strain and without 



CATALOGING METHOD 109 

error. But they are rare. Others file very well for 
a couple of hours, and then the eye and hand fatigue 
begins to tell, and frightful errors are perpetrated. 
Such persons, when they must be used for filing, 
should never be allowed to work up to their phys- 
ical limit. No beginner should ever be set to filing 
in the public or the official catalog. 

Arrangement. The rules for arrangement gen- 
erally followed are those given in Cutter's Rules (4th 
ed., p. 111-129). It would be an admirable thing if 
the main features of these rules could be reduced 
to small compass and posted conspicuously about 
the catalog. They might well be printed on some 
of the guide cards used in each drawer. 

It is to be feared that the arrangement of large 
card catalogs will always prove a difiicult matter, 
even to one who has had long experience in consult- 
ing them. Because of the necessity for proper ar- 
rangement of sub-headings, series, headings which 
are identical in form but not in sense, headings of 
almost exactly similar form, etc., the card catalog 
will always need an interpreter in practice. It is 
helpful to indicate (preferably on a guide card) the 
subheadings to follow every principal entry, whether 
author or subject, as is generally done in book cata- 
logs. By means of this device the reader can tell 
just where he is to look among subject cards filling 
half a tray for the particular subhead of which he 
is in search. 



110 MODEKN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

Non-alphabetic arrangement. It is ordinarily- 
assumed that the arrangement in a card catalog 
must be an alphabetic one — at least in other than 
classified catalogs. Under subjects, however, it 
may well be a chronological or inverse-chronological 
order which is followed. 

Books falling within a certain period may well be 
grouped in the card catalog as they are in most 
classification systems and as they would be in a 
scientific bibliography. There is even a certain 
convenience in placing the card for the latest book 
first under subject headings. A specialized library 
would find this arrangement a great benefit to its 
readers. 

Guide cards. A card catalog can hardly have 
too many guide cards. If the catalog is to be 
handled by many persons, the guides should be 
protected by celluloid, or metal tips. Several pat- 
terns of these are on the market. In the matter 
of numerous guides librarians, who gave the card 
index to business, may well learn from the practice 
of commercial houses. A guide should be made for 
each author heading having fifteen or more cards, 
and for each sub-heading. Every subject heading 
and sub-heading should have a separate guide card. 
Where so many guides are used they need not be of 
such extremely thick bristol board as is now com- 
monly employed. The filers should be held re- 
sponsible for making guides as needed. 



Chapter VII 
SUBJECT HEADINGSi 

There are no such fixed principles for subject 
entry as years of practice have developed for author 
entry. But few guides to subject cataloging have 
been published,^ and there has been no general 
agreement on the theory of the subject catalog such 
as the development of the printed card has produced 
for author catalogs. 

And yet no library worthy of the name fails to 
give its readers some sort of clue or guide to the 
contents of its collections. Its first purpose is, 
generally speaking, to provide an inventory of its 
books as they stand on the shelves (shelf -list), then 
to give an inventory by authors (the author cata- 
log), and last, perhaps because most difiicult, comes 
the index, or guide, or key to the subject matter of 
the books. Most librarians are fairly well satisfied 
with their shelf -lists and author catalogs if they are 
reasonably up to date and accurate. But few 
librarians and fewer scholars who use libraries are 
thoroughly well satisfied with their subject catalogs. 

1 Adapted in part from a paper read at the A. L. A. Con- 
ference, 1906. 

2 Cutter's iSw^es contain some admirable chapters on the 
theory of subject entry. 

Ill 



112 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

The principles of author entry are indeed not all 
determined. But the comparative simplicity of 
the rules now in force, and the substantial progress 
already made toward uniform and sane entries 
show that we are fairly successful on the side of 
author cataloging. Methods of indicating to read- 
ers what the library possesses on the subjects of 
interest to them are by no means so simple or so 
uniform. This chapter, then, is devoted to some 
of the important problems of subject cataloging. 

There have been two convenient tools available 
for use in forming catalogs of subjects. The Amer- 
ican Library Association List of Subject Head- 
ings, first published in 1895, and last issued in a 
revised form in 1912, has been generally followed 
as a guide both for form and for specific headings. 
This is a handy compilation for public libraries, 
but is of little value to libraries of other sorts. The 
tables of sub-heads, etc., are valuable, and the 
numerous references suggested will at least raise 
many questions in the mind of the cataloger assign- 
ing subjects. 

The Library of Congress Hst is now (1914) almost 
completed, and has been available in parts for some 
time. It is, of course, on a very much larger scale 
than the American Library Association list, and 
therefore more likely to contain helpful suggestions. 
The headings printed on the cards issued by the 
Library of Congress are a constant commentary 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 113 

on the application of the list. Names of places and 
persons are not printed in either list. They will 
be found to form a very large percent of the total 
number of subject cards. The Library of Congress 
list shows naturally very many sub-divisions of 
topics which smaller libraries do not need to follow 
at the outset. The cards on a given topic can al- 
ways be taken up as a block for sub-division when 
this becomes desirable. 

Uniformity in rules. At present no two libra- 
ries are likely to agree on their entries for subjects 
which are not proper names. While a man may 
go into almost any American library and find the 
entries for authors practically the same as in 
most other institutions, he never knows whether 
his previous experience will aid him in running 
down books on any given topic. The very fact 
that the unit card may be made to fit into any 
scheme of subject entry, whether classified or alpha- 
betical, has rendered librarians indifferent to the 
need or desirability of uniform methods of treating 
subjects. Moreover there is generally no guide 
furnished (in the case of dictionary catalogs, at all 
events) to the method which has been followed. 
An investigator is left to find this out from his 
actual study of the catalog. This practice — or 
lack of practice — is clearly a strategic error. Every 
possible effort should be made by m^eans of signs, 
guide cards, labels, etc., and even by explanatory 



114 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

pamphlets and personal assistance to render the 
use of the subject catalog speedy and accurate. 
Uniformity of treatment of subject entries is un- 
doubtedly to be secured in the future by agree- 
ment between librarians as uniformity in author 
entries was in the past. 

Simplicity. It must be laid down as the prime 
essential of all subject catalog work that the end 
in view is the rapid and easy consultation of the 
catalog by the student who uses it. I say *' stu- 
dent/' because no one spends much time on a subject 
catalog who is not interested in some subject to the 
extent of wanting to see what books the library has 
on that topic. Now he must not be discouraged 
at the outset by a formidable and intricate machine 
which only an expert can use. The catalog must 
be so constructed that he can discover easily and 
quickly what he wants to know. This seems a 
simple requisite. Yet practice shows that it is 
one of the most difficult ends to secure. No 
amount of ingenuity can make a subject catalog 
which shall be absolutely without flaw in the matter 
of uniformity; no one can always consult it without 
effort. The student who knows at least a little of 
his subject and related subjects must then be the 
normal ''public" of a subject catalog. But his 
road must be made straight and the rough places 
must be made plain for him. Ease of consultation, 
then, may be laid down as a fundamental basis for 
work. 



SUBJECT HKA.DINGS 115 

Rapidity and ease of consultation will be secured 
only by most careful planning. There are certain 
decisions which must be made by every librarian 
beginning or revising a catalog of subjects. Once 
taken, these decisions must be adhered to, while a 
change once decided on must be carried out root 
and branch. Too many subject catalogs are med- 
leys of opposing decisions of different catalogers, all 
made in good faith and with the best of motives. 
As compared with the author catalog there are few 
means of checking divergences. Careful planning, 
then, is half the battle. It matters little, from one 
point of view, what the decision is. The important 
thing is to have a conscious policy and to stick to it. 

Uniformity in treatment. The larger the library 
the greater is the need for uniformity in the matter 
of subject headings. The small library need not 
concern itself greatly about principles of subject 
entry. When its books are all easily accessible, 
its readers and the library staff alike will rely on 
classification and current bibliography rather than 
on catalogs. When a man can go straight to the 
shelves and pull down in a few minutes all the books 
in the library having any possible bearing on the 
thing he wants to know, he does not care much for 
a set of cards in a tray. But the library which con- 
fidently expects to become large must needs beware. 
The day when the librarian or reference librarian 
with his ordinary topis can answer all ordinary 



116 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

questions will pass suddenly, and then, if the sub- 
ject catalog work has been badly or inadequately 
done, come confusion and trouble. Particularly 
is this true of college libraries. Their catalogs are 
likely to get out of hand easily, and they are liable 
to periods of sudden inflation by gift, and the most 
careful attention is needed lest the entries under 
subjects become the butt of students and faculty, 
the despair of the reference librarian, and the tor- 
ment of the cataloger. 

Changes of nomenclature. One of the greatest 
obstacles to successful work in this field is the un- 
fortunate fact that fashions in nomenclature change 
rapidly. Such headings as Mental Philosophy, 
Natural Philosophy, Fluxions, and scores of others 
current not so long since would hardly help the 
student of today. But more puzzling to him than 
these odd and old-fashioned forms will be the vague 
sort of "catch-all" headings that so frequently get 
into card catalogs which do not have to be sub- 
jected to the test of cold print. "Practical Piety" 
in one card catalog I have seen was made to cover 
all modern sociological and economic works. 

Definition. The one essential for securing con- 
tinuity and correctness in subject work is definition 
of the subject heading combined with sharp direc- 
tions as to its use in the library's practice. It is 
not enough to determine on a heading. It must in 
all doubtful cases be defined most carefully and the 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 117 

definition preserved. The manner of interpreting 
the definition in practice must also be indicated. 
In other words, a (card) list of subject headings in 
use with all needed notes should be kept in every 
cataloging room. The extent to which these notes 
should appear in the public catalog is a matter for 
individual judgment. 

Encyclopaedias. Before taking up details, let me 
call attention to one source of assistance and guid- 
ance which is too often overlooked. Since the 
seventeenth century the makers of encyclopaedias 
have been working at this problem. Scores of 
excellent encyclopaedias have been in constant use 
in our reference rooms — and even in our cataloging 
rooms — but have they been studied diligently as 
models for headings? We may be very sure that 
they have been studied by their makers with 
exactly our chief problem in mind; and that is how 
to choose a caption which shall in a single easily 
understood word or phrase express the topic to be 
treated so clearly and definitely that it may be 
found and comprehended at once. The good ency- 
clopaedias do not show the fatuous entries and refer- 
ences found even in good catalogs. There is doubt- 
less a reason. It lies partly in the excellence of the 
editorial supervision for which publishers can afford 
to pay, and partly in the undoubted fact that each 
encyclopaedia is based on half a dozen, or perhaps 
half a hundred, predecessors, and thus the headings 



118 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

as well as the articles are in a continual state of 
revision. The fact that the headings are all in 
print in convenient form, and are easily seen and 
found, is also a great aid in producing uniformity 
of editorial treatment. Still the fact remains for 
us to ponder. Encyclopaedias seem to present 
fewer difficulties in consultation than subject cata- 
logs, and are familiarly and easily used by many 
people to whom a card catalog is a bugbear. 

Specific headings. Everybody is agreed on the 
fundamental principle that in dictionary cataloging 
the ''specific" subject must be the norm. We 
want to get exactly the caption which fits our book 
and no other. Especially do we wish to avoid 
general headings for treatises covering a limited 
field. A man looking for a book on trees does not 
want to be sent to look through all the cards on 
botany, nor does the inquirer for information about 
Nelson want to see all the cards on British naval 
history and biography. He wants what the library 
has about Nelson. The smallest possible unit 
must be sought out and made the basis for the sub- 
ject heading. 

Class headings. But the library has also books 
— many thousands of books, probably — which do 
not deal with one small, particular topic. It has 
treatises on Botany and British naval heroes. 
Hence there arises of necessity a set of subjects of a 
general nature, which are in effect identical with 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 119 

the large divisions of the classifications. We have 
general treatises on Philosophy, on Religion, on 
Sociology, on Philology, and so forth. And, fur- 
ther, we have general works on such topics as 
Physics, Electricity, Mathematics, Latin literature, 
Hydraulics, Political science. Psychology, side by 
side with works of equal bulk and importance on 
divisions of those subjects, such as Heat, Alternat- 
ing currents, Differential invariants, Latin pastoral 
poetry, Canal locks. Proportional representation, 
the Sense of touch. There must be general head 
ings, class headings, in the catalog. The difficulty 
is to use them wisely. These general headings must 
never be used for anything but general treatises 
of an inclusive sort. They will be the same in a 
classed and in a dictionary catalog, and should be 
treated alike in both. Moreover, a first-rate dic- 
tionary catalog will use under these class headings — 
or headings common to both sorts of catalogs — a 
few of the simple and large subdivisions of classifi- 
cations, such as History, Essays and addresses, 
Outlines, syllabi, etc. In doing this it will not 
violate the dictionary principle. 

But we should stop right here. Use the class 
headings when needed, but let everybody under- 
stand that they are strictly limited in their scope. 
Put it on the guide card so that all may see that 
'^ General works only are listed under this caption. 
For special treatises consult the cards with the 



120 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

heading of the particular subject wanted. '^ An 
example should be given in each instance, and more 
than one, if necessary. In the case of the guide 
card for Chemistry there should be a statement 
that works on particular chemical products and 
compounds are to be sought under their own names. 
The illustration might perhaps take such a form as 
this — ''for example, treatises on Chloroketodi- 
methyltetrahydrobenzene will be found under that 
word." \ 

It should be said, further, that caution is nec- 
essary at this point. Because some headings must 
be the same in any sort of catalog, and because 
some which are definitely group headings have to 
be used as a practical matter of common sense in a 
dictionary catalog, catalogers are continually re- 
verting to these class headings. It is vastly easier 
to label a book Sociology than to pin its generally 
elusive contents down to one particular phase of 
social inquiry. We all tend to move unconsciously 
along the lines of least resistance. We shall never 
get our catalog of specific headings without con- 
stant vigilance, constant self-criticism, and drastic 
revision. We must have class headings so long as 
libraries are not composed wholly of theses for the 
doctorate. And we must avoid them as much as 
possible. 

Literary form headings. There is a special kind 
of class heading which occurs with exasperating 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 121 

frequency, i.e. the so-called ''forms of literature," 
such as poetry, ballads, essays, orations and fic- 
tion. Shall these be left out of subject catalogs? 
Many libraries omit them. Shall we say to the stu- 
dent looking for German ballads, ''They are all 
classified in number so and so? " But then, they are 
not all so classified. There are dozens of volumes 
of them in collections of one sort and another, for 
one thing. Shall we let novels go without subject 
cards and depend on a special finding list of fiction? 
Shall we lump them all under Fiction in the subject 
catalog? Shall we subdivide fiction and the 
"forms" by language, or perhaps by nationality? 
Or shall we classify fiction in our subject catalog, 
and put historical novels with the history divisions 
to which they supposedly belong? In answer, it 
is enough to say that the form divisions in a subject 
catalog when thoroughly made and kept up to date 
are a great help in reference work. (And the refer- 
ence work should be in close touch with the catalog 
work for their mutual good.) It is, moreover, a 
considerable advantage to carry out the principle 
that every author card, generally speaking, should 
have a subject card matching it. Incidentally it 
may be remarked that some librarians have found a 
mild form of the classification of fiction a great help. 
I refer to such headings as U. S. History, Civil war, 
Fiction, which have satisfied many a lazy body who 
wished to take his history diluted and disguised. 



122 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

Subject or region. There are few librarians who 
will not follow us up to this point. Everyone agrees 
that we cannot wholly escape headings which are 
the same as the major divisions of any classification, 
and most libraries make some sort of subject lists 
of their works of so-called pure literature. But 
when we come to those large subjects which from 
their very nature suggest a geographical subdivision 
we leave uniformity behind. There is hardly any 
such thing, for example, as a treatment of Mathe- 
matics, or Logic, by countries, although we do find 
works on Greek Mathematics. These are, how- 
ever, incidental to a certain period in the develop- 
ment of the science, and not a proper regional divi- 
sion such as may well be demanded in the case of 
Agriculture, or Geology, or Architecture. The 
pure sciences, then, do not enter very largely into 
this problem. But a very large proportion of the 
subjects about which books are written offer a 
double interest. They may be considered from the 
view-point of the region or country described, or 
from that of the subject treated. A work on the 
geology of Texas, for instance, may seem to belong 
to Texas, and to require the subheading Geology; 
or it may appear to have its chief interest for the 
geologist, in which case it goes under Geology, with 
the inevitable subhead Texas. This is all familiar 
enough. Mr. Cutter (Sec. 164) insisted that the 
only satisfactory solution of this problem was that 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 123 

of double subject entry. With this view I cannot 
agree. A consistent policy with regard to this class 
of subject headings which will rigorously enter 
under either the topic or the country is demanded 
in the interests alike of economy and of common 
sense. Whatever decision is taken, a reference 
must be made from the opposite form. Thus, if 
the library decides to enter under Geology. Texas, 
there should be a subject reference from Texas. 
Geology. Such a subject reference is much better 
than duplication of hundreds of subject cards. 

But what shall the policy be? The practice of 
our leading printed catalogs is extremely varied. 
On the one hand we have a tendency to provide 
long lists of subheads under each country. This 
is the practice at least impliedly recommended in 
the American Library Association's ''List of sub- 
ject headings" by the printing of the long list of 
subheads to be used under country and state. On 
the other hand, to cite but a single instance, the 
Subject Index of the British Museum restricts 
vigorously the entry under the country or region, 
and allows but few subheads. Between the two 
plans there is a great gulf fixed. One assumes that 
a reader thinks along geographical lines when he 
wants a book, and looks under Greece for a book 
on Greek Architecture or Mythology, or for a 
treatise on the Geology or Agriculture or Education 
of that country. Perhaps he does. The other 



124 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

presumes that a reader considers his subject first, 
and then runs down its geographical ramifications 
later. Is there any principle on which this matter 
may be decided? Must we in each case make 
special decisions? There is at least one principle 
which favors grouping by countries rather than by 
topics. It is generally held that the dictionary 
catalog should supplement rather than copy the 
classification. Now the books witl doubtless be 
classified on the shelves by subjects rather than by 
country in these topics which admit of double treat- 
ment. Therefore if books treating of such topics 
as Education, Missions, Agriculture, Slavery, 
Architecture, Painting, etc., from a regional or 
national point of view — as Central African Missions 
— and not covering the whole field, are entered 
under the country or region, the subject catalog 
will show more about those regions than the classi- 
fication will at any one point. This seems almost 
the sole argument for making use of this form of 
entry. 

Now, on the contrary, it would seem that the 
British Museum practice and that of the Library of 
Congress are more nearly in line with the habit of 
readers and the view-point of the makers of books. 
If we leave out the historical sciences, the main in- 
terest is the topic and not the region. In the pure 
sciences we have already noted the elimination of 
the regional or national principle. In the applied 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 125 

sciences and the arts, both useful and fine, we may 
safely do the same thing. These divisions are very 
extensive. It is well, then, to adopt a deliberate 
policy of restricting the entries under the country or 
region to those topics which have a strictly local 
interest, i.e., the field of the historical sciences, and 
such of the social sciences as depend for their value 
on local conditions. To be specific, do not put a 
book on the geology of Texas under Texas, but 
under Geology with the subheading Texas. Limit 
the subheads under a country to those which seem 
absolutely necessary. For everything else which 
might be expected under country make a subject 
reference card. This may be begging the question. 
It may be abandoning the search for a guiding 
principle. But it seems to me that the habit of 
most readers and authors is a fair guide. After all 
it is for them that the catalog is made. 

One word before leaving this topic. At no other 
point of subject catalog work is definite adherence 
to a fixed rule more necessary than here. A deci- 
sion once taken in this matter should be rigidly exe- 
cuted. If this is done, the people who use the cata- 
log will quickly learn to follow the principle adopted 
and will in consequence consult the catalog with 
ease. 

Ethnic adjective. If the practice of restricting 
the entries under subheads of countries or locality 
be followed, we at once encounter the difficulty of 



126 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

the co-called ''national adjective." Having elimi- 
nated Yrance.Art, are we going to cut out French 
Art, Greek Mythology, Roman Roads? Certainly 
we must. We must say Art.France, Mythology. 
Greece , Roads. Eome, or we shall soon find ourselves 
in a maze of confusion. It will, however, be nec- 
essary, to use the national or linguistic adjective 
with the literature or language of a country or 
region. We shall probably be obliged to say French 
language and French literature, since France.Lan- 
guage and FrsLiice. Literature do not necessarily 
express the same ideas. As in the case of France, 
so also in many other instances the national and 
linguistic areas are not identical. German lan- 
guage and German literature, for example, are 
wider in their scope than the political boundaries 
of the present German Empire, and the same is 
true of the English language. The linguistic and 
national areas are different in Switzerland, in India, 
and in many other regions. Another objection to 
the use of the ethnic or national adjective is found 
in the fact that we have all sorts of corporations 
and institutions whose names begin with American, 
British, French, etc. Read the headings beginning 
with either ''American" or "British" in the pub- 
lished catalogs made on the dictionary principle 
of any of our libraries, and see what a medley is 
produced by the mingling of names and topics. 
The national adjective should be eliminated from 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 127 

subject headings, save for the two linguistic usages 
mentioned. This will cause some trouble, for a 
great many people are accustomed to think of 
American Indians, British commerce, French por- 
celain, etc. But the practice will save trouble, too. 
It will reduce the number of places in which one 
must look for a topic (the chief drawback of Poole's 
Index) , it will obviate much apparent confusion in 
the arrangement of headings, and it will introduce 
some system into alphabetical subject catalogs at 
a point where system is much needed. The prac- 
tice of the encyclopaedias is against the extensive 
use of the national adjective.^ 

It may be objected to this that we merely transfer 
our excessive use of subheadings from the country 
heading to the subject or topic heading. It may 
further be urged that by this plan the subdivisions 
under topics become very unwieldy. Of course 
the subheads undoubtedly become more numerous 
under the topic, but they belong there rationally, 
and there will be plenty left under the country. 
The person consulting the catalog is obliged, it is 
true, to run his eye over many guide cards, and per- 
haps over several trays to find his particular books. 
But that is far easier for him than going from one 
part of the catalog to another, looking now under 
France and now under Spain for a work on the 

3 There are some exceptions, notably the most recent 
edition of Brockhaus. 



128 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

mineralogy of the Pyrenees, for instance. Again 
he remains certain, after looking at the subdivisions 
under Mineralogy, that he will not have to look also 
at the cards headed Pyrenees Mts. — he has all the 
cards before him for Mineralogy. We cannot 
eliminate subheadings from the alphabetical subject 
catalog. At least, if we can, no one has arisen to 
to show us how. If a separate guide card is 
used for each heading and subheading, we shall 
find the difficulty of consultation very greatly 
diminished. 

Inversion. It will have occurred to those who 
have followed this discussion thus far that a good 
many subheadings under both country and subject 
might be avoided by the use of inversion. We 
might say, '^ Roads, Roman," ^'Architecture, 
Gothic," '' Psychology, Social," etc. The use of 
inversion has its chief defense, it seems to me, in 
the fact that it keeps together related topics. It is 
certainly convenient to have '' Psychology, Ani- 
mal," ''Psychology, Comparative," "Psychology, 
Morbid," "Psychology, Social" in orderly se- 
quence and close together. But despite this con- 
venience, as a matter of form of heading, the prac- 
tice of inversion is to be regarded as fully as per- 
nicious in the dictionary subject catalog as in the 
author catalog. The objections to it are patent and 
well known. There is one catalog which regularly 
and always inverts, which enters under an adjective 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 129 

form only in the rarest instances. I refer to the 
magnificent Index Catalogue of the Surgeon Gen- 
eral's Library. No one will dispute the high 
authority of this catalog as a scientific product. It 
is the most remarkable thing of the kind ever done 
in this country. But I imagine that despite its 
example we may be more truly scientific if we set 
our faces squarely against inversion. The worst 
thing about inversion is the utter lack of certainty 
as to which of several forms may be used. If in our 
author catalogs we have come to the point where we 
can write '^ Michigan. University/' why should 
we not write ^^ Psychology. Animals" f There is 
not space to elaborate here the argument against 
inversion. We must be content to dismiss it with 
the single proviso that well established phrases be- 
ginning with an adjective such as Republican Party, 
Political Science, etc., need not be called in ques- 
tion either by those who would always invert to 
serve their convenience, or those who are stead- 
fastly against the practice of inversion. The larger 
question whether the ordinary phrase, e.g.. Com- 
parative anatomy. Animal psychology, should 
not always be employed instead of some device 
whereby the noun remains in the first position is 
well discussed by Mr. Cutter in his Rules. My own 
opinion is for the regular use of the current phrase 
in the form in which it habitually occurs in titles, 
remembering that there are numerous cases in 



130 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

which a caption with proper subhead better ex- 
presses' the idea. 

Geographical headings. There is one class of 
subjects which gives trouble alike to classifiers 
and catalogers. Wherever a classification or a 
catalog is subdivided on a geographical basis, or 
wherever geographical headings are given, the fact 
stares us in the face that ''geographical expres- 
sions," to use Prince Metternich's phrase, are by 
no means permanent or dependable. The map of 
the world has suffered startling changes since books 
began to be made. Certain difficulties which con- 
front us in geographical headings deserve attention. 

Continents. Even the continents give trouble. 
The terms America and Asia are used very loosely 
in popular speech, and even in indexes of subjects. 
Does North America include Mexico and Central 
America? Where does Western Asia leave off and 
Central Asia begin? Does the term America as a 
heading or subheading include both North and 
South America? Shall we write America, North or 
North America? What do we mean by Central 
Africa? These are questions which have but to 
be asked to raise sharply the point that definition 
and consistent adherence to definition are essential 
in the geographical terms to be used. The official 
catalog of subjects should certainly contain very 
carefully planned directions as to the use of conti- 
nental designations, as well as those of the smaller 
divisions of geography. 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 131 

Extinct nations. But troublesome as ill-defined 
geographical concepts may be, they are nothing in 
the way of difficulty compared to the names of re- 
gions which have ceased to represent present po- 
litical conditions. There are a number of countries 
which no longer exist as states, whose political life 
as separate entities has ceased. A region such as 
Poland, for example, which has been absorbed by 
one or more countries offers a most perplexing prob- 
lem. The word Poland corresponds to nothing 
on the map or in official gazetteers, but it is still 
in everybody's mouth. Travellers still use the 
old national name on title pages of descriptive 
works; historians and others write on former or 
even present-day conditions. And yet in our larger 
libraries we have official documents and other works 
treating of this once independent state from the 
standpoint of Prussian, Austrian and Russian 
provinces. We can not get around the difficulty 
Vy lumping everything under the popular name. 
Neither can we ignore it in the case of travel and 
descriptive works. (Of course I am not referring 
to books on Poland before the partition.) There 
are plenty of similar cases, although few with such 
complications. It seems that the common name 
must still be used where it is employed on title 
pages, and that the official regional designation of 
the present day must be employed where needed 
because of either the title or the contents of the 



132 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

work. This will necessitate a lengthy ''See also" 
reference, a thing to be avoided wherever possible. 
Ancient regional names. Ancient and mediaeval 
states and countries with no continuing name or 
precise m-odern geographical equivalent give less 
difficulty. Their ancient names may safely be 
used. The trouble is, however, that both descrip- 
tive and historical works dealing wholly with pres- 
ent-day (or at least modern) conditions frequently 
employ the ancient name in titles. In such cases 
the modern form of name should be regularly used 
as a heading. Such ancient regions as Pontus, 
Epirus, Dacia, Africa, Gaul, Granada (Kingdom) 
may well receive separate subject entry, but it will 
instantly be seen how much confusion would arise 
from using these headings for modern works dealing 
with present conditions. Take ''Africa," for ex- 
ample. Properly used it means (in antiquity) the 
single Roman province erected on the ruins of the 
Carthaginian city-state, limited in its extent to 
about the boundaries of modern Tunis. So used 
the term has a distinct value. But a modern work 
on Tunis, or even a discussion of archaeological 
problems occurring in this limits of the ancient 
province should not receive the heading of Africa. 
There is, then, great need for care and a well-de- 
fined policy in these matters of ancient geographical 
designations which have no precise modern equiva- 
lents. Somewhere a very careful working out of 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 133 

the proper limits of the subject heading adopted 
for such countries and regions must be accessible 
to the cataloging staff, and perhaps to the public. 
It will not do, for instance, to say merely, '^ Tunis — 
See also Africa (Roman province);" '^Africa 
(Roman province) — See also Tunis." These loose 
'^See also" references, are the refuge of careless 
catalogers. In their stead must be a careful ex- 
planatory note giving the dates and boundaries 
within which the heading is applicable. 

^' See also. " It may be worth while to insert at 
this point a word as to these ''See also" references. 
It was a rule at some time in the dim and distant 
past of cataloging to make ''See also" references 
from each subject named on a title page to every 
other subject so named. All students of catalog- 
ing methods well know some of the ludicrous results 
of this rule. It is creditably reported that as a 
result of this rule rigidly applied such references as 
these were made and printed. "Brain, See also 
Cheek, Tumors of the;" "Cheek, Tumors of the, 
See also Brain, " because forsooth both subjects got 
into one of the long-winded titles of earlier days. 
Probably these "See also" references cannot be 
wholly eliminated from catalogs. It is a very good 
thing at times to have a student reminded of allied 
topics and similar headings. But the tendency 
to their abuse is so great that it would seem a better 
course to make carefully worded explanations rather 



134 MODEKN LIBRAKY CATALOGING 

than to multiply these references. And we should 
not suffer greatly were they excluded entirely from 
the subject catalog. 

Period divisions. To return to matters geo- 
graphical. Few problems are more difficult as 
matters of actual practice than the making of a 
perfectly clear arrangement in a card catalog of 
easily understood and intelligible headings for 
countries or regions which have had a continuous 
written history from ancient to modern days. The 
most conspicuous of these are Egypt, Greece, 
Rome, and Syria. The boundaries of Egypt have 
been practically the same from antiquity to the 
present day. Hence we are not so much troubled 
by the question of the physical extent of the head- 
ing. But we are directly ''up against" the ques- 
tion whether we shall say Egypt (Ancient), Egypt 
(Graeco-Roman) , Egypt (Saracenic) , Egypt (Turk- 
ish), Egypt (Modern), or something of this sort, 
or whether these headings should be used as second 
subheads following the recognized subdivisions 
under the country. For example. Taxation is a 
frequently employed subheading under country, 
and we happen to have a great mass of material 
on taxation in Egypt in many ages. Shall we 
write Egypt ( Ancient). Tao^aifzon, Egypt (Graeco-Ro- 
man). T'aa:ai5^on, etc., or Egypt. Taxa^fori. (Ancient), 
^gypt.Taxation(GYaeco-B.oinsin period), etc? The 
second method keeps the country as the main 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 135 

heading and places the period last, and is therefore 
preferable. But in neither case can we get away 
from three alphabets in arrangement. The method 
advocated, namely, of keeping the period division 
last and considering the topic as the more important 
matter, falls in with our ordinarily received method 
for modern states. Thus we generally find such 
headings as this: United Stsites. Taxation (Colo- 
nial period), rather than United States. (Colonial 
period) .Taxation. Whichever method is adopted, 
whether we break up the country's history into 
certain well-defined periods and treat these as if 
they were separate wholes, or whether we regard 
the country in all its history as one and arrange top- 
ics under it with chronological divisions, the dates 
of the different periods will have to be worked out 
with care and recorded in the official list of head- 
ings. When this is done it will probably be found 
that the books seldom fit the dates previously ar- 
ranged. What to do with overlapping books — 
books which fit into no general scheme — is a sore 
problem in cataloging as in classification. We 
must either go on forever making new and more 
minute subdivisions and arranging the subject 
cards chronologically by the first date in the head- 
ing, or else we must assign the subject by the pre- 
ponderance of interest of the book itself, placing it 
in that division of the subject where most of the 
narrative or discussion falls. The majority of 



136 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

catalogers will doubtless prefer the latter method. 
The specific dates may be put in the heading as a 
matter of guidance to the person consulting the 
catalog, but in this case they will be ignored in filing. 
Rome presents worse difficulties than Egypt. 
In the first place we have to encounter the 
fact that both the city and the state — originally 
one — have a voluminous literature. Confusion 
here is disastrous, and yet it is found in many cata- 
logs. The city of the seven hills must be a subject 
by itself, reserved for separate treatment. Its 
municipal history is to be kept separate — where 
possible — from the march of the mighty empire, 
and its monuments must receive treatment distinct 
from that of Roman remains in general. It would 
seem a very good plan in arranging cards to put the 
country heading first, then the city heading, and 
finally the heading for its numerous monuments 
and regions. Thus we should have such classes 
of headings as ^ome. History. Empire, Ilome(city). 
History. Middle Ages, Rome (city). Forum Romanum. 
If this distinction between the city and the 
state is not made in this and other cases, we shall 
have a confusion which will make our catalogs 
unusable. Moreover, in treating the Roman state 
it will be as necessary to define dates and boun- 
daries as in the case of Egypt. There is no need 
to go on to speak in detail of Greece and other 
countries having a continuous recorded history of 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 137 

manj^ centuries. The need for careful planning in 
giving subjects to works on such countries has been 
fully shown. 

Ancient and modern names. Still another cause 
of confusion is closely allied to these we have just 
been considering. We have numerous cases in 
which ancient and modern geographical terms do 
not mean the same thing. I have already cited 
Africa as an example. The loose habit of catalogers 
of projecting modern geographical terms into the 
past is most discouraging to students. Take, for 
example, such designations as Germany and 
Austria, to cite large regions. Their boundaries are 
not today what they were even fifty years since, 
and books describing particular regions not formerly 
in their limits and referring wholly to former times 
should not be listed under the modern caption, if 
suitable ones can be found in the older names. 
This is merely the principle of the specific heading 
applied to geographical problems. Again in certain 
particulars the modern geographical term may 
represent a much smaller area than the same term 
at an earlier date. Venice and Genoa are instances 
in point, and many more might easily be cited. A 
book on the Venetian remains in the Greek islands 
hardly deserves a subject, Yemce. Description and 
travel, although one on the Venetian supremacy in 
the Levant might well have a subject entry under 
Venice. Separate geographical entities such as 



138 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

islands and peninsulas are more easily treated as a 
rule than other regions, as confusion is less likely 
to arise in their cases. 

Finally a word should be said in protest against 
subject headings of an indefinite sort for frontier 
or partially settled regions. '' The West " in Amer- 
ican history is one such. The phrase ''Old 
Southwest" is another. The objection lies rather 
against the indefinite nature of the heading than 
against its use, if once it be well defined. The 
various regions in Central Africa offer similar 
difficulties. 

Subjects having an old and a modern literature. 
If countries having a continuous recorded history 
present difficult problems to the cataloger, so also do 
subjects of inquiry which have given occupation 
to generations of scholars. Such studies as political 
science, economics, philosophy, mathematics, chem- 
istry, botany, medicine, theology, rhetoric, etc., had 
their beginning for our Western world in Greece 
and are live topics today. History and description 
of countries show the same long line of writers. Now 
it is obvious that some discrimination is needed in 
cataloging the authors who for twenty odd centuries 
have discussed such important subjects as the 
theory of the state, the art of healing, or the science 
of mathematics. The distinctions which a printed 
catalog can show by varieties of type and the rapid 
view of many pages with their headings are of 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 139 

course impossible in a card catalog. If it is mani- 
festly improper to compel the student seeking the 
library's best treatise on agriculture to turn over 
numerous cards for editions of Cato and the other 
Scriptores de re rustica, so also is it unwise to 
neglect the fact that agriculture and all other 
sciences have their historical side. If we are going 
to give subjects to all our books, then Cato must 
have a subject card somewhere under agriculture. 
Here is where the average dictionary catalog breaks 
down. It furnishes under such topics as those we 
have mentioned a dreary array of cards, frequently 
many trays of them, through which the discouraged 
student must work to find his modern books. 
Every hundred thousand volumes added to the 
library but increases the task of consultation. The 
cards thus become what no one wants, an alpha- 
betical list of all the writers who have ever treated 
of a given topic. The catalog must either distin- 
guish books whose value for the subject is purely 
historical, or it must arrange its cards chronolog- 
ically (by author), putting the latest works first. 
In other words, the alphabetical principle of sub- 
arrangement must be abandoned under subjects, 
or else we must introduce another division under 
these subjects having a continuous history, i.e., a 
class of books having an historical value only. 

But when does a book begin to have a merely 
historical value? There's the rub! It is not pos- 



140 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

sible to determine this by chronology alone. Can 
we consider Aristotle of merely historical im- 
portance in the discussion of poetry or drama, of 
political science or ethics? Most assuredly not. 
But yet his works on physics and natural history 
are absolutely without profit to the average student 
of today. No one will say that Kant's writings are 
out of date, and yet his psychology would hardly 
benefit the modern student in our college classes. 
It is plain that discrimination of the highest order 
must be employed in this matter, or else we must 
adopt some mechanical arrangement such as the 
filing of cards in chronological order, which after 
all works a sort of rough justice in the matter of 
relative values. Who can say that the trays 
headed Theology or Law in most of our catalogs 
of libraries of over one hundred thousand volumes 
are practically useful as they stand today? Who 
would not rather consult a good bibliography and 
then the author catalog for books on those topics 
than attack the direful array of cards in the hope 
by some means of at length securing an interesting 
and valuable set of references? 

In formal political history and in economic his- 
tory as well the sources should certainly be dis- 
tinguished from the recent treatises. The Ger- 
mania of Tacitus, for instance, is an excellent source 
for the early history of the German Empire, but 
it is positively foolish to list it side by side with the 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 141 

works of Von Sybel and Ranke under Germany. 
History. The subhead of '' Sources" under history 
is a convenient and valuable limbo for bygone 
works and for collections of documents. There is 
opposition, and sensible opposition, however, to 
using it for merely obsolete treatises. 

Arrangement by period. We might adopt some 
such scheme as this: 
Political Science. Modern works {since 1850) and 

important earlier works, 

Works between 1500 and 1850. 

Mediaeval works. 

Ancient works. 

The divisions suggested here might perhaps be the 
same in all cases, or they might better be made to 
conform to well-recognized divisions in the history 
of each topic. The alternative plan is the arrange- 
ment of cards by date of publication, or by first 
date of the author (to keep editions together) . The 
latter arrangement seems best, although it by no 
means commits the library to the position of as- 
suming that the most recent work is necessarily the 
best. Still the chances are that it represents the 
most recent stage of investigation. Almost every 
librarian is willing to concede this in the matter of 
bibliographies, acknowledging that the last to ap- 
pear should first meet the eye of the person consult- 
ing the catalog. Why not adopt the same principle 
for every topic, as is done in some of our libraries? 



142 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

We have, be it remembered, the author entries at 
hand for every one who already knows the authors 
he wants. Why compel the seeker after information 
to wade through another author list under each 
topic? It may be observed that an annotated 
catalog would be almost forced to put first its cards 
for the books most highly recommended. 

Number of subject cards to a book. There are 
a few practical points to be taken up before closing 
this chapter. First, shall we definitely limit the 
number of subject cards to a given book? In view 
of the immense size to which card catalogs are grow- 
ing is it wise to say that when the library reaches a 
certain size — say 500,000 volumes — it will hence- 
forth assume that the necessity for making cards 
for any other than the subject of prime interest in 
a book has passed? Shall we take it for granted 
that there will always be other works which cover 
the topics of secondary interest? This view is 
maintained in some libraries. I venture, however, 
in opposition to this idea, to call attention to the 
statistics of certain work at Princeton published 
in the Library Journal for June, 1906. It was there 
shown that the number of subject cards per main 
entry was 1.47, and per title 1.2, although no re- 
striction was placed on the catalogers other than 
a rigid insistence on the specific heading in all cases. 
This is so nearly the result aimed at in the rule 
that I submit that it is a better way of attaining 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 143 

the desired restriction of the unduly rapid growth 
of the card catalog than the strict limitation to one 
subject per book. It permits the liberal handling 
of a book which treats definitely of several topics, 
and yet it does not too greatly burden the subject 
catalog. The device of using but one subject entry 
for the various editions of a work whose value is 
chiefly historical would diminish the percent of 
subject to author cards to less than one. 

Again, it may not be amiss to urge that the re- 
vision and coordination of subject headings should 
be definitely assigned to one person. Only thus 
can continuity and uniformity of the work be se- 
cured. Particularly is this provision needed in our 
largest libraries. It is also a most vital matter of 
practice that the chief reference librarian should be 
in constant touch with the cataloger who passes 
finally on subject headings. They will work to- 
gether to great mutual advantage. 

Official list of subject headings. Moreover I wish 
once more to set forth the imperative necessity 
for an ofiicial list of headings in use in the library.^ 
This should be kept up to date with the utmost care. 
Each cataloger should have in convenient form a 
list of all subheads previously authorized under 
each class of topics, together with definitions of all 
these subheads. The official list without defini- 

* See above, p. 84-85. 



144 MODERN LIBRARY CATALOGING 

tions and notes will be of some small value, 
but with them will be vastly more useful. It 
should be kept where every cataloger can consult 
it. The American Library Association list, the 
Sydney list and the new Library of Congress list, 
admirable as they are in their own way, will not 
suffice for any large library. An up-to-date list 
of subjects with adequate definitions kept on cards, 
is an absolute necessity in a well-ordered catalog 
department. 

Is the card catalog of subjects alphabetically 
arranged a real service to an institution? Most 
assuredly it is. When once it is made on consistent 
principles, when the student no longer has to fumble 
long trays of cards without sufficient headings or 
guides, filled with all the contradictory accumula- 
tions of generations of catalogers, when the specific 
topic stands out prominently, when each subject 
capable of two interpretations is sharply defined 
on a guide card, when consistency in geographical 
matters and uniformity of entry and sub-entry in 
topics of debatable form have been reached, there 
is no reason why a student should not find the card 
catalog of subjects self -interpreting, inclusive, 
useful. It has the all-important merit of definite- 
ness and point. It tells anyone who knows his 
topic what he can get directly on it. It lists both 
the obsolete book and the dead and gone state by 



SUBJECT HEADINGS 145 

themselves. It opens up to the reader the contents 
of the library. It is, in short, an alphabetical sub- 
ject index to the books. If this is not worth while, 
what library effort is? If this be formal, dry-as- 
dust work, why work with books at all? Our aim 
as librarians is not merely to accumulate books. It 
is to help the reader to the books he wants. In a 
large library the only tool which accomplishes this 
result is the catalog, and of this the subject catalog 
is the part most difficult to make, most useful when 
well made. 



INDEX 



Accuracy, in cataloging, 57. 

Added entries, 103. 

Alphabetic-classed catalog, 45-47. 

American Library Association. 
Booklist, 68; Catalog rules, 39, 51, 
64, 76, 79, 80, 91; Cat. rules com- 
mittee, 36; List of subject head- 
ings, 84, 112, 123, 144; Publishing 
Board, 17. 

Analytical cards, 101-102. 

Ancient names of modern countries, 
132, 137. 

Annotation, 97-99, 

Aristotle, 140. 

Arrangement (of cards), alphabeti- 
cal, 40, 41, 47, 109; non-alphabeti- 
cal, no, 141-142. 

Astor Library, New York, Cat. 13. 

Austin, Willard H. Report on aids 
and guides, 27. 

Author's name in title, 91. 

Becker, Gustav. Catalogi bibl. anti- 

qui, 11. 
Berlin. Konigl. Bibliothek, 29, 74. 
Bibliographies in card form, 27. 
Biblioth^que Nationale (France), 

Cat. gin. d. livres imprimes, 13. 
Bond, H. Classified vs. diet, cat., 45. 
Boston Athenaeum. Cat., 13. 
Boston Public Library, 74. 
British Museum. Cat. of printed 

books, 13, 47, 101. 

Subject Index, 123. 
Brooklyn Library. Cat., 14. 
Brown, J. D. Library class, and 

cat., 81. 



Card cases, 25, 28. 

Card catalog, a development of the 
19th cent., 15; variant forms of 
cards in manuscript cat., 15. 

Cards, ruling, 30; size, 28, 64; weight 
and quality, 29, 30. 

Catalogers, Reports (individual), 
54, 55. 

Catalogers in reference work, 41, 62. 

Cataloging, should precede acces- 
sioning, etc., 56. 

Cataloging force, organization, 50- 
57. 

Cataloging rooms, 19-28; space al- 
lotted to, 19, 20; location, 20; floor 
plan, 21; furniture, etc., 22-24. 

Catalogs. Cost, 34, 49, 55-57; forms, 
40-46; full or short, 36-38; history, 
11-18; number and kinds, 33-35. 

Catalogs in book forms, 12-14. 

Classed catalog, 42-45; index there- 
to, 44. 

Concilium Bibliographicum, Zurich, 
29. 

Codes of cataloging rules. See A. 
L. A. Catalog Rules; Cutter, C. A. 
Rules; Dewey, Melvil, Library 
School Rules, etc. 

Collation, 39, 94. 

Contents note, 96. 

Continents, subject headings, 130. 

Copying, 105-107. 

Cumulative book index, 68. 

Cutter, Charles Ammi. Rules for 
a diet, cat., i2, 78, SO, in, 129. 
Why and how a diet. cat. is made, 42. 



147 



148 



INDEX 



Date and place of publication, not 
to be omitted, 93. 

Desks, 21, 22. 

Detroit Public Library. Cat., 14. 

Decisions to be recorded, 81, 82. 

Dewey, Melvil. Library school rules, 
78, 80. 

Dictionary catalog, 40-41, 48; supple- 
mented by class-lists, etc., 48. 

Doubleday, W. E. Class lists, 42. 



Inversion in subject headings, 128- 
129. 

Jahr, Torstein and Strohm, A. J. 

Bibl. of cooperative cataloguing, 17. 
Jewett, Charles Coffin. Plan for 

stereotyping cat., 16; Construction 

of cat. of libraries, 17. 
John Crerar Library. Catalog, 48; 

prints cards, 74. 



Edition, 92. 

Egypt, subject heading, 134. 
Encyclopaedias as models for sub- 
ject headings, 117. 
Evaluation, 97-99. 
Eye-strain, 23. 

Fletcher, W. I. Future of the cat., 45. 

Flexotype, 24, 52, 107. 

Filing cards, 108-110. 

Full names, 38. 

Fumagalli, Giuseppe. Cat. di biblio- 

teche, 78. 
Furniture of cataloging rooms, 22. 

Guide cards, 31, 109, 110, 119, 120. 

Hague. Royal Library, 74. 

Harvard Univ. Library, 74. 

Hastings, Charles H. L. C. printed 
cards, 65. 

Head cataloger, duties, 50, 51, 53, 87. 

Hectograph, 105. 

Hours (cataloging work), 62 

Hulme, E. W. Dict^subject catalog- 
ing, 42. 

lies, George. Biir. of review, 97. 
Imprint, 92. 
Ink, 107. 

I nstructionen fiir d. alphab. kat. d. 
preusz, bibl., 79. 



Kant, I., 140. 

Kroeger, A. B. Diet. cat. vs. bibliogr., 
42. 

Ledger catalogs, 12. 

Library Bureau, 17. 

Library of Congress. Annual re- 
port, 1902, 17; 1905, 30; Cat. of Copy- 
right entries, 68; Handboolc of card 
distribution, 65, 77; List of subject 
headings, 84, 112, 144; Monthly 
list of state pub., 68; printed cat- 
alog cards, 17, 18, 28, 29, 64-77, 
79, 83, 89 ; accounting, 70; authority 
in determining entry, 51; number 
needed, 65; ordering, 66-72; scope 
of stock, 72-73 ; supplemental rules, 
80; use in other libraries, 75, 76; 
proofsheets of cat. cards, 27, 28, 
39, 67, 89. 

Library schools, 60. 

Linderfelt, Klas August. Eclectic 
card cat. rules, 78. 

Main entry, 88, 89. 

Massachusetts Record Commission, 

107. 
Multigraph, 106. 

New South Wales. Public library, 
Sydney. Guide to system of cat., 
78. 



INDEX 



149 



New York Public Library, 74. 
New York State Library. Cat. 

reference books, 26. 
Notes, 92, 95, 96. 

Official catalog, 35, 82. 

Peabody Institute Library, Balti- 
more. Co^,13, lOL 

Period divisions, subject headings, 
134-136. 

Perkins, Frederic Beecher. San 
Francisco cat., 79. 

Photoduplication of title page, 52, 
108. 

Pittsburgh Carnegie Library. Clas- 
sified Cat., 14; prints cards, 74, 

Pollard, A. W., 42. Meditations on 
directories, etc., 45. 

Princeton University Library, 45, 
142. 

Printed catalog cards. Early theo- 
ries, 16, 17; file of, in library, 39, 
83; Library of Congress makes 
and sells, 17, 18; printed by Ameri- 
can libraries, 74; use of , in libra- 
ries, 63-77; use in conjunction 
with ms cards, 37, 83. 

Qualifications of catalogers, 57-60; 

accuracy, 57; linguistic abilitJ^ 

58; general information, 59. 
Quinn, John Henry. Diet. vs. class. 

cat., 45; Manual of library cat., 

79,81. 
Quintilian, 11. 

Raney, M. L. Multigraph and flexo- 

type in cat. work, 106. 
Reference books for catalogers, 26. 
Reference cards, 104. 
Revision of cataloging, 51, 52, 54, 76. 
Rome, subject heading, 136. 



Salaries of catalogers, 61-62. 

Savage, Ernest Albert. Manual of 
descriptive annotation, 97. 

"See also" references, 133. 

Series cards, 99-100. 

Shelf-list, 33, 42, 43, 48. 

Spain. Instrue, para la redaccidn 
de los cat., 79. 

Statistics of cataloging work, 53-54. 

Strohm, Adam Julius, 17. 

Subject cards, number to a book, 
142. 

Subject catalog, kept separate from 
author catalog, 47. 

Subject headings: changes in, 116; 
class headings, 118-119; definition 
of, 85-116; ethnic adjective, 125- 
127; geographical headings, 130- 
133, 134-138; Inversion, 128-129; 
literary form headings, 121; offi- 
cial list of, 84-86, 143-144; old 
and modern books on same sub- 
ject, 138-142; passed on by head 
cataloger, 51; period division, 134- 
136; simplicity, 114; specific, 118, 
120, 142; subject or region, 122-125; 
uniformity, 113, 115. 

Title, 90. 
Title entry, 104. 
Typewriters, use of, 23, 107. 

Uniformity of entry in various rec- 
ords, 34, 56, 82. 

"Unit card" system, 34, 86. 

U. S. Bur. of Education. Library, 74. 

U. S. Bur. of Fisheries. Library, 74. 

U. S. Dept. of Agriculture. Library, 
74. 

U. S. Geological Survey, 74. 

U. S. Surgeon-General's Library, 
Index-Cat., 14, 129. 

Ujiited States Catalog, 1912, 68. 



150 INDEX 



University of Chicago, Library, 74. Vienna University. Kat. d. Hand- 

bibl., 27. 
Vienna. Hofbibliothek. Vorschrift. 
d, alphabet, nominal-zettelkat., 79. Wilson (H. W.) Co., 68. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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